


The Perks of Being a Wallcrawler

by Geekasauruz



Category: Avengers, Captain America, Hulk - Fandom, Ironman, Marvel, Spider-Man - Fandom, Spiderman - Fandom, comics - Fandom, peter parker - Fandom, spider-man/oc - Fandom
Genre: Awkward, F/M, Funny, Humour, Love, Peter Parker - Freeform, Romance, Spider-Man - Freeform, quirky, spiderman - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-24
Updated: 2019-11-24
Packaged: 2021-02-25 23:53:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 31,343
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21544072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Geekasauruz/pseuds/Geekasauruz
Summary: Being a superhero sounds pretty cool, right? If you answered 'yes', then you'd probably be correct...unless you're talking about Peter Parker. In that case everybody hates you, life sucks, and nothing ever goes according to plan because doing the 'right' thing sometimes means sacrificing what you want most. Well...there is an amazing girl in one of his college classes. But, as per usual, a win for Peter Parker is a loss for Spidey...especially when a pretentious new superhero tries to cut in on his turf.
Relationships: Peter Parker/Original Female Character
Kudos: 2





	1. Chapter One: The Girl With Meatballs In Her Hair

**Author's Note:**

> This book is part of a Marvel series that I'm working on. Each story is inspired by the comics with small influences from the movies. In other words, these are entirely new stories that will interlink and conclude in one epic Avengers arc (The Gauntlet). It is not necessary to read them all if you're not interested, but characters and events will be showing up across all of the stories (just like they would if they were living in the same city). They do not have to be read in any particular order. ☺️

Roger Norton was a nose picker. Now, this might not sound like essential information, but when you're stuck in an elective lesson on literature from the 16th century, something as meaningless (and unhygienic) as a grown man picking his nose was a godsend. Roger, who was almost broader than his own desk and at least twice Peter's height, would whittle away the hours with a large sausage finger shoved up his nasal cavity. He'd push it around, forcing the Columella to stretch in compensation for this sudden intrusion, then yank it out again with a fresh booger that he'd then wipe on the bottom of his chair. 

He even walked around campus like this. As if nose-picking was all he was ever meant to do with his life. Peter had once considered warning him that if he fell he might poke his brain out, but it struck him that losing intelligence was not something that Roger was worried about. After all, he'd only been accepted into this college through his football scholarship, not his brain power. 

Thankfully for Peter's sanity, Roger wasn't the only distraction to be found within those dull grey walls. Another came in the form of a small girl on the other side of the classroom. Annabelle Lee. Her hair was the color of fallen leaves; sleek with the first rain of autumn. For those of you that are less poetically inclined, this means that her hair was brown - and it was twisted into two buns that sat on either side of her head, like two big dumplings...or meatballs. Peter's stomach growled at the thought. What he wouldn't give for a plate of Aunt May's spaghetti right about now.

Annabelle's eyes didn't seem to help either. They were like two glasses of freshly filtered water. Not the poor excuse for a beverage that lurked in a tap. It made Peter's throat itch dryly, begging for something to quench the first signs of dehydration. 

Okay, this wasn't usually how he'd describe a girl that he found relatively attractive, but he was starving. Upon arriving at the campus he'd been ten minutes late for class, meaning that he was unable to retrieve his daily dose of university-grade cafeteria food. 

Peter slumped further into his seat with a glum expression, trying not to be overwhelmed by his own hunger as he glanced back over at Belle. She wasn't his usual type, that he could admit. His ex-girlfriend Mary Jane had once been his vision of a perfect woman; amazing body, bedroom eyes, amazing body, long red hair, and, not to mention, such an amazing body. Instead of MJ though, who flaunted the whole 'could turn you into a drooling heap if you stared too long' aesthetic, Annabelle catered more towards the 'watching movies at home with takeout and five adopted dogs' kind of look. As Peter grew older, he found that the latter was becoming more and more appealing. 

Momentarily, the young genius found himself lost in the rhythmic swing of Annabelle's earrings. They were shaped like two sunny-side up eggs; the yellow yolk perfectly rounded within the white border. Peter hadn't eaten eggs in years now...not since he moved into his run-down apartment in probably the worst neighbourhood in New York. Not only would he likely burn the entire building down if he were ever to even attempt flicking the stovetop on, but he didn't have a cent to his name. Honestly, one cent would have been a massive improvement. 

"Mr. Parker?" The highly distinguishable voice of his teacher, Miss Adamson, spoke. Peter immediately straightened in his chair with an inaudible gulp. The whole class was staring at him. Dozens of eyes all peering at the same spot, as if he had just spontaneously combusted. Peter wished that he had. It would have been preferable to the embarrassment. 

"O-Oh, ah, yes?" Peter stuttered. Then inwardly cursed himself for it. 

"Could you read the next passage for us? Or do you need time to catch up." She teased knowingly, resulting in a few rather loud snickers of amusement. Peter rubbed the back of his head sheepishly, and Miss Adamson sighed. "Please pay attention from now on. We're on Act 2, Scene 1, Page 9. Read the first line from Petruchio out loud." 

Peter fumbled with his copy of Shakespeare's 'The Taming Of The Shrew', rushing through the pages so fast that, had he been a lesser man, he would have given himself at least five paper cuts when he finally found the right passage. He could feel Belle's filtered water-like eyes on him, and that certainly wasn't helping his confidence. "So, you want me to read it now?"

"Unless you've got something better to do, Parker." The teacher quipped, folding her arms over her chest and tapping her index finger on her elbow impatiently. 

Peter cleared his throat. There was something stuck in it. Like saliva or nerves...or an entire apple core. It was hard to know which. 

"You lie, in faith; for you are called plain Kate, and bonny Kate and sometimes Kate the curst." Peter managed to speak without his voice completely failing him. "But Kate, the prettiest, Kate in Christendom, Kate of Kate Hall, my super-dainty Kate, For dainties are all Kates, and therefore, Kate, take this of me, Kate of my consolation." Peter grimaced. How many times could this guy use the word 'Kate'? The more he was forced to say it, the weirder it sounded. He assumed that this man, whoever he was, was speaking about the same person...but Peter was so lost that it sounded like he just had a ton of girlfriends all with the same name. "Hearing thy mildness praised in every town. Thy virtues spoke of, and thy beauty sounded. Yet not so deeply as to thee belongs. Myself am moved to woo thee for my wife."

The good news was that Peter had managed to read all of that without fail, and Miss Adamson was satisfied enough to move her attention elsewhere, the bad news was that he had no idea what he had just said. Seriously, literature wasn't his strong suite at all. He could create a web that was strong enough to swing him across the city, but also that degrades within the hour, but when it came to things like poetry and old dudes writing about women called Kate he was at a total loss. 

It didn't help that he was tired as well. Much too tired to even pretend to know what was going on. Peter hadn't slept in a full 48 hours, and his eyes were struggling to pry themselves back open every time he blinked. Between university, his low paying lab assistant job, and his other job, there wasn't much time for rest. 

Peter thought that, maybe, he could close his eyes for a few brief moments but then the screeching of chairs against tiles pierced his sensitive ears. He forced his eyes back open, only to see the class beginning to file out. They did so silently, as if small pieces of their souls had been consumed by Shakespeare. Peter could relate.

With a exasperated sigh, Peter clumsily reached over to regather his books. In his exhaustion, however, he only succeeded in pushing them off his desk. They fell with a crumpled 'bang' that stabbed at Peter's dwindling self-confidence. He had super-human reflexes and Spidey-sense but he still managed to constantly drop his stuff on the ground...

Peter took a few seconds to glare at the handful of papers, debating with the idea of leaving them there and hoping to find them again next week. That's when a pair of ink-stained hands started gathering the books for him. It didn't take long for him to realise who it was. The bumble bee shaped ring on her index finger gave it away, and the pen smudges that lined her fingers. 

Peter dared to glance upward, and was met with Annabelle's bubbly smile. She placed the messy pile of folders and books back onto Peter's desk and spoke, "You look tired, Pete. You should get some sleep." 

Her voice wasn't like the melodic ring of bell chimes, nor the gentle whistle of an ocean breeze, or anything else that someone like Shakespeare might describe. It was lower than most women, and raspy. The exhilarating ripple in her voice was more akin to wild tonic in the rain...or something like that. No, actually, that didn't make any sense at all. 

"Y-Yeah, but doesn't Shakespeare have that effect on everyone?" Peter joked with a sleepy grin, one that quickly disappeared with Belle's reply. 

"Not me. I think he's a genius." 

Damn it, Peter! You could have just nodded your head and thanked her for the concern, but instead, you had to be a smart ass... 

Peter's internal scolding might lead one to think that his luck with women was very limited, but that analysis wasn't entirely accurate. The truth was that Peter Parker had absolutely no luck at all with them. Not even enough to warrant it being limited. Ever since his break up with MJ, he seemed to be an eternal on-sale item in the dating market that everybody bypassed for the fancier merchandise. 

Peter chewed on his bottom lip, immediately attempting to retract the statement, but that only made him feel worse. "You do? M-Me too! I mean his plays are a little long...and there's a lot of big words but, yeah, once you get past all that it's alright." 

"Big words?" Belle cocked her head to the side, and those two buns jostled ontop of her head. "Aren't you a science major or something? I would think that big words are a way of life for you."

Well, that was true enough. Peter could read every word within these literary works, but the problem was that he just couldn't comprehend what they were trying to tell him. It was all so...open, and Peter's brain didn't do well with anything other than straight facts and set rules. "Yeah...I suppose. I just always struggled in English, big words or not." 

Belle's eyelashes, long and darkened by light wisps of mascara, grazed against her cheeks as she looked down to the books Peter had previously dropped. Right on the top was a massive publication of 'Advanced Biophysics By Doctor Curtis Connors'. "Is this for your course?" 

Peter laughed somewhat nervously. "Nah. I'm taking Chemical Engineering. That's just some light reading."

"That's what you call light?" Belle chuckled. "You couldn't pay me to read all of that, especially if it's about that kind of stuff." 

Obviously, she had the complete opposite problem; a brain that could easily decipher a novel and follow iambic pentameter, but that would drown in a world of science. Belle re-secured her bag onto her shoulders. It often tried to slide down her arms because she adjusted the straps too widely. Once she had completed that hourly task, she started sauntering towards the exit. She brought a hand up to wave at him. The nails were short and uneven; proof that she had a habit of biting them. "Get some sleep, Pete."

"Th-Thanks!" He called to her, gathering his books with much less force than before and shoving them into his backpack. He stumbled over to the door, catching view of Belle as she skipped down the hallway. 

Once she had vanished from sight, Peter dug into his right pocket and pulled out his phone. It was an old Nokia with dents littering its surface and, despite the notion of these phones being indestructible, he had broken the screen in almost four different places. He had one text from Mary Jane, who he'd managed to stay friends with even after the break-up, and a missed call from his Aunt May. He wanted to dial back, but he was so tired that he couldn't even will himself to open the text. 

Arriving home to his small apartment was like a blessing from God. His bed was calling his name, like a seductive mistress draped in fine silks and paid her weight in gold. The only difference was that his blankets were definitely not silk. They were old, stained by various things that Peter couldn't even recall, and in desperate need of washing. Also, he wouldn't be able to afford a mistress. Just last week he wanted to get a two dollar packet of crisps from the vending machine...and was twenty cents short. Scratch that, he was still twenty cents short.

He really needed to organise more Spider-Man pictures for the Daily Bugle so that he could finally afford those chips. 

Chucking his backpack onto the pile of trash that littered his floor (seriously, there was barely any 'floor' left beneath the dirty clothes), Peter collapsed onto his mattress with a sigh of absolute bliss. He thought he'd never feel the calm of sleep dwindling over his mind again. He was so close...so so close to falling into the deepest slumber of his life. Then a noise from the deepest reaches of Hell pierced his ears. Police sirens. 

"No..." Peter whined, tossing back and forth on his creaking bed. "No no no no no!"

It took every single ounce of strength that Peter had left to slide off his bed, and even more to find his Spider-man costume in his pigsty of a room. As if hoping it had been magically cleaned during his absence, Peter brought it up to his face and sniffed. His entire expression scrunched into revolt, but there was no time to dwell on the disgusting odour. He swiftly threw his clothes off, letting them join the plethora of others discarded around the apartment, and tugged the costume on.

"Alright, pull yourself together." Peter muttered to himself, slapping each cheek a few times to ensure that he didn't fall asleep on the spot. "Crime doesn't sleep, and neither do you. You're spider-man...spider's don't sleep. I mean, I don't think they do. Damn, it's really sad that I don't know that. Even sadder that I'm talking to myself about it."

Shaking away the sleep that still threatened to overwhelm him, Peter rushed over to his small not-so-cold fridge. The inside was like a grocery store aisle dedicated to only energy drinks and nothing else...except for one stray bottle of mustard that some kid didn't put back. Peter grabbed the yellow condiment and poured some into his mouth. Gross. Either this mustard was out of date (which was very likely) or man was simply not meant to fulfill the curiosity of drinking it. He reached in to grab an energy drink, throwing the mustard to the back of the fridge and sculling his beverage. 

It only took two very large sips before the can was empty and he chucked it on the ground with everything else. He had to mentally praise Johnny Storm for always keeping energy drink stocked up at his house...and for sharing it with Peter whenever he asked because there was no way in hell he'd be able to afford it himself. Maybe next time he could snag a few cartons of two-minute noodles as well...

With the delicious thought of chicken broth swirling in his brain, Peter yanked the mask over his face and jumped out of his window. One swift press of his middle fingers against the device strapped to his palm summoned a long rope of web fluid, one that latched onto the much nicer apartment block next door. It sent him swinging through the streets of New York, following the familiar noise of sirens. 

It didn't take long for him to push past the cop car that had alerted him of the crime and stumble across the scene. A few lowly criminals had been robbing the richer parts of the city, and much to Spider-Man's delight, he had arrived there before the police. 

The webslinger jumped into the groups path. There were six of them, but only two looked to pose any real threat. "I don't suppose you're going to come quietly?" 

The largest man in the centre bared his teeth in typical villain fashion, and that was enough to assume that he had been the mastermind behind this small string of robberies. "Get him!"

Spider-Man shrugged. "Didn't think so."


	2. Chapter Two: A Day in the Life

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One mediocre fight and no sleep later, Peter meets up with MJ for a little R&R.

The burglars didn't put up much of a fight, but what really mattered was that they had tried their best. Truly. It was inspiring to watch them keep trying to hit Spider-Man, knowing very well that he was too fast for all of them. Peter had to give them a few pity shots just to make them feel a little better about the loss. He could imagine them now, cooped up in their cell, insisting that they had landed a punch to Spider-Man's jaw. It gave them a false sense of hope that was likely unhealthy, but still made them feel as if they hadn't been completely floored in the fight. Which they had been. Pretty badly.

Upon retiring into his civilian clothes; which consisted of a hole-ridden shirt and a pair of his Uncle Ben's old sweatpants, Peter was plagued by one small question. Did spiders really sleep? What had started out as a simple distracting thought had turned into a curiosity that consumed his mind. Peter was halfway through googling the answer when he remembered that he still hadn't replied to MJ's text...actually, he hadn't even looked at it yet.

Peter swiftly closed the internet tab and opened his messages. The text from Mary Jane was short and simple, but sent dread through Peter's core; 'Where are you?' Damn it. He had promised to meet her at the cafe/burger place on Houston street, aptly called 'Burgatori'. It had been her idea, but that name alone was enough to make Peter want to eat there.

With a hitch lodging itself in his throat, Peter quickly texted back and rushed to their meeting place. He wasn't proud of the amount of laws he broke in his rush to get there; including jaywalking and ignoring the red crossing lights. He had almost gotten hit by a grand total of four cars before he finally made it to the small cafe, immediately spotting Mary Jane through the window. The red hair was a dead giveaway...and the fact that she was drop dead gorgeous. That probably helped as well.

Peter stumbled into the building, almost tripping over his own two feet as he dashed towards her table. "Sorry, were you waiting long?"

MJ's lips quirked upward and she feigned looking at her watch. "Just one hour and thirty minutes. Not too bad considering how late you usually are."

"I'm really sorry..." The man's voice was sincere, but it always was. There was never a moment in his life that he wasn't sorry, but he continued to do those things regardless. That was probably part of the reason they broke up. Peter slid into the chair opposite to his ex-girlfriend, trying not to look at her for too long; as if she were the sun, and any direct glance might temporarily blind him. "I had-"

"You had things to take care of." Mary Jane finished for him, leaning back in her seat and shrugging. "I know, tiger. You always do."

Peter pouted, staring at the mahogany table and analysing the cracks in its surface. She was always very understanding of his situation, but his role as Spider-Man had also been the very thing that tore them apart. All he could offer her was a mask, and Mary Jane deserved much better than that.

This didn't stop him from loving her though. Even as she moved on he felt like he was being left in the distance, doomed to admire her from afar. The pain got a little easier to live with every day, but it would take a little longer for him to detach his heart from hers. "How's Eddie doing?"

"He's good. Working hard, but always manages to find time for me." Mary Jane smiled gratefully at his inquiry. She had been dating Eddie Brock for about six months now. Peter wasn't a fan of him, personally, but it seemed to be going well for her. "And what about that girl you told me about? The one in your class?"

Peter's fingers tapped against the table anxiously. He did have a small soft spot for Annabelle, but he had only mentioned her because MJ kept hounding him about getting 'back on the horse'. Peter had never understood that expression. What did a horse have to do with dating? He hated horses. They smelt funny and bucked him off whenever he tried getting close. "She's alright, I think."

"You think?" Mary Jane raised a perfectly trimmed eyebrow, and Peter was entranced by how graceful she could be with just that small shift in expression. "Do you, like, talk to her at all?"

"Y-Yeah, I do. It's just that..." Peter trailed off with a sigh. "You know how I am... How I get when I'm around someone that I like. I immediately lose 900,000 brain cells or something."

Peter could vividly recall the first time he tried to talk to MJ. Ironically, there was no talking at all on his end. Just a bunch of weird sounds that replaced any words he might have wanted to say. Also, he had dropped a bowl of steaming hot soup on her favourite dress. It wasn't a proud memory.

"You just overthink things." Mary Jane said with a sympathetic smile. "Be yourself. That's all you have to do."

"Thats easy for you to say." Peter huffed. She was a model. Everyone liked her before she even opened her mouth to speak. Not everyone had that luxury, or that amount of self-confidence. Outside of his suit, Peter still felt like that loser kid that no one would sit next to on the bus.

"Are you ready to order?" A man asked, breaking the conversation with the promise of food. Peter glanced up, and as he waited for MJ to order, he found himself transfixed on the waiter's moustache. It was a solid, grey millipede firmly obscuring the man's upper lip; a Village People moustache, a cowboy moustache, the miniature head of a broom that meant business. He couldn't tear his eyes from it.

"And for you, sir?" He said once Mary Jane had placed her order, but Peter's focus wasn't deterred. Perhaps this was a direct result of his lack of sleep, but either way, his mind was full of nothing but the facial hair he could never seem to grow for himself. No matter how hard he tried, his face simply wouldn't grow anything close to a full beard.

"Sir?" The waiter tried again, but to no avail.

The only other person that Peter had ever seen with a moustache like that was Mr Rollen, his maths teacher, and he collected digestive crumbs in his – Peter used to count them during algebra because he'd often finish his work before anyone else.

"Hey, you alright?" MJ's voice finally tore him out of his exhaustion-induced trance.

"Oh. Yeah. Sorry. I'll just uh...have some water." Peter said in apparent disappointment as he remembered how utterly broke he was.

Mary Jane shook her head. "He'll have a plate of nachos and a coke. Thanks."

"W-Wait no, just water." Peter then stared daggers into MJ's face. "No...! What are you doing...?" He hissed.

Mary Jane, fluttering her eyelashes, peered at the waiter. "Nachos and coke, honey." She repeated.

The waiter nodded, then left. Peter was filled with the same guilt that he felt every time he ate out with Mary Jane. She always paid for him, but he could never repay the favour. "MJ, what the heck was that?"

"Your stomach's been rumbling ever since you got here." Mary Jane countered. She crossed her arms. Beautifully. Like a swan. Though he supposed if a swan ever crossed their wings it would look a little strange. This didn't though. So maybe not like a swan, but still very prettily. "Don't worry about it. My modelling gig pays well, if you hadn't already guessed. I can spare a few dollars."

"...But...b-but...ugh." He groaned.

The redhead smiled softly at him. 

"Thanks, MJ. Really." It was all he could say. Peter wished he could give her something more substantial...something special like a shooting star or a copy of Albert Einstein's actual notes when he was figuring out the theory of relativity. Maybe that sounded a lot more romantic to Peter than it would to her though.

The cafe slowly filled, and their conversation jumped from one topic to the next. She asked about Aunt May, he told her that she was doing well, but in reality she was buried in debt. She was too old to get a job and she couldn't keep up with the payments. Still, he pretended as if she were living a comfortable life. The one that Peter wished he could give her.

Then, their drinks came. Apparently this cafe was one of the only places to bring them out with the food, and not a full hour beforehand. Peter hated when they did that. He'd smash through several drinks before ever touching his meal. There were two waiters this time. One with the beverages, who turned to serve the other customers after placing them on the table, and another with the food.

"Nachos?" A familiar voice spoke and Peter froze. With a regrettably audible gulp, he let his gaze wander upward. There he saw her, Annabelle, with her weird hair and ridiculous stockings that sported images of ladybugs on them. She was always the most colourful person in the room, with a clothing style that somehow sat between a small child's and a sixty year-old's.

He leaned his elbow against the table. Was that lame? It was cool in those eighties movies Peter frequented, but had 'cool' changed with the times? Did he look like a loser? Peter quickly removed his elbow.

"Th-That would be me." He managed to say, watching the girl's face light up in realisation.

"Pete? Fancy meeting you here." She chimed, placing each dish on the table in front of them. Her attention turned to Mary Jane, and her grin only brightened. "You must be Peter's girlfriend."

Peter, who had taken a large gulp of coke to ease his dry throat, almost spat it all back out again. Thankfully, Mary Jane was much better at social interaction than he had ever been. "Easy, we're just two friends catching up. How do you know Peter?"

She already knew, because Peter had already told her, but the sly glint in her eye made him believe that this was no coincidence. Somehow, MJ had known that Belle worked here.

"We're in the same literary studies class." Belle answered cheerfully.

Peter continued sculling his drink, as if it might hide him from the conversation. He imagined that it was a super powerful serum that might turn him completely invisible, so that the embarrassed flush starting to rise on his cheeks would remain unnoticed.

"Literary studies?" MJ turned to Peter, and that was when he realised that he had, in fact, not turned invisible. "Aren't you studying Chemical Engineering?"

"...I needed an elective and it was the only thing on offer that fit my schedule." Peter said lowly.

Noticing Peter's growing unease, Mary Jane drew her attention once more to Belle. For the first time, she finally noticed Annabelle's choice of fashion. As a model, and a passionate follower of clothing brands, it was surprising that it took her this long to actually look. Belle wore a fuzzy jumper that gave her the appearance of an emu, or a baby sloth. Her hair was woven with clips that any little girl would be envious of, and her shoes were covered in glitter.

"Those are nice." MJ said, pointing to the footwear. It wasn't clear whether she was being serious or not. "Where'd you get them?"

"I don't know. Thrift shop, probably." Belle said with an obvious lack of interest in such things, turning to show the heels that held a large insect within them. "It has spider's in the back. I thought they were real so I got them."

Mary Jane smirked. "Nice. Peter hates spider's, don't you?"

Peter narrowed his eyes at the redhead. Did she enjoy watching him get stressed out?

"That's a shame. I don't think they're too bad." She replied, despite the fact that she was literally wearing them in the heel of her shoes. Dead ones. Always stepping on them . "I need to get back to work, but it was good to meet you."

Annabelle left, the same skip in her step that she always possessed. God, she looked like a crazy woman; a meatball haired, fuzzy jacketted, ladybug stocking wearing lune. He loved it. 

"Well, she's-"

"Weird?" Peter finished her sentence with a raised eyebrow.

"Quirky." MJ corrected. "I was going to say quirky."

Well, she wasn't wrong. That was probably the kinder way to say it.

One would assume that, in any normal situation, Peter would have sat there and cleaned his plate. Talking to MJ about life until they both agreed to leave. Unfortunately, Peter's life was anything but normal. He had only managed to eat half of his nachos when the sound of screaming filled the air. Outside the window people were running away from something, and MJ sighed at the sight. "Go gettem, tiger."

She had only blinked, but when she looked back to where Peter once was, he was gone. Mary Jane wasn't surprised. She was used to it


	3. Chapter Three: Crikey, Mate!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prepare for the most average fight ever written as Peter fights one of his deadliest enemies... The Kangaroo.

The Kangaroo was one of Spider-Man's deadliest enemies. Now stop laughing, it's very true. Well there was that one time where Peter thought the villain had gotten himself blown up or something, but hey, it turns out he didn't get blown up. Seeing as he isn't blown up, The Kangaroo is going around Midtown kicking down secure vault doors with his rippling thigh muscles and proceeding to loot whatever materials he could fit into his pouch. He has a pouch now. It's new.

Spidey stumbled upon the scene of a forced entry after hearing the alarms go off from a couple blocks away. With quite the astounding level of acrobatic finesse and ballerina-like grace, Peter spun through the air after releasing from his previous web swing and went barreling through the hole that had been kicked through the bank's front wall. 

After a ludicrous double front flip, he landed in a low crouch in the bank's lobby. "Hey! I think the bank's closed now! So you should...probably come back later!" He called into the darkness.

"No...no...! For God's sake...I just got outta jail...!" A very obnoxiously Australian voice snarled from the distance. Seconds later, the Kangaroo came stomping out with a massive angry frown on his middle-aged face. "I'm gonna clock ya one, mate."

"Yeah, please don't. I'm chronomentrophobic." 

There was silence as Peter stood with his hands planted proudly on his hips, staring expectantly at the Kangaroo who, quite frankly, seemed to be as confused as most people were when Peter started using words with more than four syllables. 

Peter said "It's...it's a fear of clocks. Because...because you were gonna...you know. Clock me."

"Why does everyone around 'ere like you?"

"They don't." Spidey replied, pointing both fingers at The Kangaroo. 

Peter snapped a hand forward and shot a web net outward at the Kangaroo, who due to his spectacular lower body strength, managed to bound into the air and evade the shot like...like a Kangaroo. 

Suddenly, as Kangaroo came barrelling down with Spidey in his sights, who was witnessing his life flash before his very eyes in the wake of his foe's tremendous power, a car tire flew from out of sight and struck the Australian criminal in the forehead. He was pushed backward by the 'wheelie' effective strike. Peter watched in amazement as Kangaroo's landing turned into a crash landing, face scrunched in confusion.

"Was that...a tire?"

"Yeah. Someone just threw a tire at me." Kangaroo said in disbelief.

At the entrance to the bank, or more so the hole in the front of it, stood a woman with long blonde hair, wearing a black jumpsuit that was also black with black highlights. Her face was covered by a domino mask.

"Hey, did you just attack this guy with a tire? A tire?"

The woman shrugged "I dunno, fuck off."

"Oh. Uh. Okay." Peter said in confusion.

Kangaroo shook his head and made a mad dash for Peter, who was predictably warned by his Spider Sense. Like really, what else was going to happen? The Kangaroo was going to kill him? Come on. I think we all know how these stories play out by now...

Peter wove free of the tackle, webbed his Australian foe, swung him around in the air, then released. The criminal went crashing into a row of wooden seats in the far side of the bank.

Peter dusted his hands off and looked back at the costumed woman "Alright, I have this under control...uh...whatever your name is. What is your name?"

The woman cocked her head with a smile that told Peter that he had just made her day by asking her name. He knew the next part would not be good. "I'm Protonslaught."

Peter squinted. Kangaroo could be heard yelling things like 'struth' and 'fair dinkum' because, was it ever mentioned, he was Australian. 

"You know. It's proton and onslaught put together."

"Yeah don't worry. I got that part." Spidey reassured lowly.

"Why weren't you laughing?"

"Because I'm not ten years old?"

"Whatever, Jizz-Hands Man." 

Peter scoffed in disgust. "Ew."

"You shoot white stuff out of your hands."

"Hey it doesn't come out of my hands. It comes out of these gadgets I made."

"Oh...that's kind of stupid. You call yourself Spider-Man and you don't even make webs."

Peter crossed his arms. "Hm, maybe I crawl on walls. And have the proportionate strength of a spider. What do you do? Slaughter protons?"

The tension in the air was thick, like the skull of a person who failed to realise that Pacific Rim 2 was just a Power Rangers movie. 

The Kangaroo finally broke out of Peter's webbing then pounced back over into the main lobby. "Alright, playtime's over, ya bloody idiots. You're really gonna cop it now."

Peter gestured towards the approaching foe, being a gentleman and letting the lady have a go.

Protonslaught asked "Stand back, Jizz-Hands. I've got this."

"Yes, defeating the almighty Kangaroo is going to be a cool moment. Because he's such a big threat. And Australian."

Protonslaught extended a palm and growled, sending a ferocious yellow blur soaring through the air. The Kangaroo was blinded when the unstoppable form of a mildly smelly banana peel slapped into his face. Protonslaught took a single step to the side and watched as the Kangaroo barged head-first into the marble wall behind her.

He was rendered unconscious. The Superhero nodded and clapped "Oh yeah. That's right. I kicked his ass and I made it look good."

"You...made a banana peel." 

"Yeah. Like you can do that. Well you can't because you're a loser."

Peter sighed. 50% of his life was already allocated to taking this kind of treatment from Neanderthals at college; he wasn't ready for it to grow to 100%. Peter strode out to the front, leaving Protonslaught to follow. "Listen Prote, maybe you should quit while you're ahead. Yeah you beat The Kangaroo, but what happens if you run into someone dangerous like Rhino? Banana peels and tires won't cut it."

"Oh shut up you asshole. I don't need to listen to you."

The time for fun and games was over for Peter. This banana peel-conjuring clown was starting to irk him. "Look, I'm just saying. I've been doing this for like seven years. Maybe you should listen."

Momentarily, police cars pulled up at the crime scene. One of the officers emerged from his squad car and looked at Peter. "Figured you beat us to it, Spidey. What's the damage?"

"Don't worry Fred, it was just the Kangaroo."

Protonslaught flicked her hair over her shoulder and pressed her hands onto her hips. "I took him down."

The cop narrowed his eyes. "Uh. Okay. Thanks...?" He glanced back at Spider-Man. "Friend of yours?"

"No, no, no, no. Nuh-uh, nope. Just met."

The woman smirked smugly and declared "I'm Protonslaught."

"What?"

"P-Protonslaught."

The cop gave her a once over before shrugging.

Protonslaught then turned over to Peter and said "Don't call me Prote. It sounds too much like scrote. Loser."

With that, the incredibly modest and level-headed superhero hovered up, up and away, as Spidey and his police officer friend watched.

"What a very...likeable individual." Peter announced sarcastically.

"You can say that again."


	4. Chapter Four: King of Swing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> While hanging out on Johnny’s couch, Peter is convinced into searching Annabelle up on Facebook. How thrilling.

Johnny Storm was a daredevil by nature. He had tried almost every extreme sport known to man, and suffered at least ten near-death experiences before ever being called 'The Human Torch'. Unlike Peter, Johnny had been popular his entire life. So, as one could imagine, gaining superpowers that didn't involve being transformed into a hideous rock monster only inflated his already unbalanced ego. 

Whenever Peter swung by the Baxter Building at this time of day, Johnny was more often than not just sitting around wasting time whilst Reed Richards worked away in the lab on some incredible scientific research. Peter, as much as he would drool over being able to watch the Reed Richards in his element, would always be reeled in by Johnny and his unwavering social ability.

"Yeah. I dunno about that." Peter declared as he munched on a huge mouthful of Doritos, eyes pinned on the TV.

Johnny, who was sitting on the couch with him, threw his arms up in defeat, groaned harshly "Dude, it's a movie. Give them some slack."

"Classic textbook response. That just means that I'm right and you don't have anything else to say."

"No, it means that I don't care about your stupid science and how that makes 'Aliens' a bad movie."

Peter, who was still dressed in his Spidey outfit without the mask, pointed at the screen and said "Hey, I am not saying Aliens is a bad movie. A bad movie is 'Conan The Barbarian'."

"What? Conan? Arnie Conan?"

"Yeah." Peter replied, throwing a chip into his mouth.

"Oh shut up. That movie's freaking great."

"I had no idea what was going on at least eighty-six percent of the time."

"Eighty-six? Why eighty-six?" Johnny pressed in confusion.

"Because James Earl Jones randomly transforming into a snake man was just too damn cool, so I removed four percent from the 'not knowing what the hell was happening' rate."

"You're crazy, man. Then what's a good movie?"

"Ninja Turtles. The nineties one."

"Bro."

"You didn't like that?" The wall-crawler mused in disbelief.

"It was fine but Jesus, Pete. That's a kid's movie."

"I dunno, Shredder gets thrown into a garbage truck and Casey Jones flicks the switch incredibly nonchalantly, like he wasn't brutally murdering somebody."

"Messed up shit can still happen in kid's movies. Just look at 'Hunchback of Notre Dame'. That priest dude wanted to screw that chick so he was like 'hey girl, either you screw me or I'll burn you at the stake, bro'. That's pretty damn crazy."

"Yeah I guess you're right. What was that guy's name? Frodo? Froyo?"

"I dunno. Don't really care either."

The room fell silent and the pair watched on as Sigourney Weaver waved a flamethrower around looking incredibly sweaty and tense. The crunching of Doritos in Peter's mouth and the sound of Johnny slurping soda through a straw were overlaid by the movie's audio.

"So...when you gettin' back together with MJ?" Johnny finally asked after a particularly loud gulp of his beverage.

Peter almost choked on one of the chips that he had stuffed down his throat. He knew that this subject would come up eventually, it always did with Johnny. "Can't you go one visit without asking me that?" 

"Nope." Johnny smirked. "I need to know whether she's available or not."

"First of all, she doesn't date idiots." Peter started, and as expected, Johnny interrupted before he could finish his statement

"The fact that she dated you proves that wrong, Pete." 

"Secondly," Peter emphasised. "The answer's the same as last time. I don't see us getting back together any time soon. We live completely different lives. It just doesn't work anymore."

"Won't that be a problem with every 'normal' girl you date?"

"This was different. She was keeping stuff from me." Peter sighed and slumped into the couch. It was the comfiest seat that he'd ever sat in, but that was of no consolation when it came to the topic of MJ. "Like she got hit on by this douchebag photographer, and lost her modelling gig because she fought back, but didn't tell me because she thought I had enough to worry about. She said that my problems were so much bigger than hers, but that's not how a relationship should work. After I found out, I realised that I was starting to do the exact same thing. We grew apart. I'll always care about her, but she requires a better man than I am." 

Johnny tapped his index finger against the cup in his hand. Serious talk wasn't really his strong point. "Ah...well, it's probably for the best. She was way out of your league."

Peter shot him a glare, and the young playboy smiled nervously. 

"I mean...you're out of hers?" This time it didn't sound convincing at all. It was painfully obvious that Johnny thought that Peter should have been dating some Neanderthal with limited speech capabilities and a face that looked like it had been hit by a few trucks. Not just one. A few. That was his league, apparently. That or stereotypical science girls. "Come on, man. You know she was way too hot for you." 

"Gee...thanks a lot for the pep talk." Peter groaned. 

Johnny rubbed the back of his head sheepishly, and though the conversation should have been over, he decided to drag it on. It was one of Johnny's very limited talents. "Find a rebound yet?"

Suddenly Peter's hunched shoulder's straightened, and with a particularly annoyed stare at his supposed 'friend', Peter said "She's not a rebound!" 

Of course, as is typical Peter Parker fashion, he didn't realise that his little outburst had given the answer away until it was much too late. 

Johnny's grin widened at this news. "Oh, so there is someone?"

"No..." Peter mumbled, but Johnny has already figured it out. "I mean, yes, but it's not like that. I barely even speak to her." 

"Alright. I need details. Name, age, and pictures. Have you added her on Facebook yet?" 

"I'm not sure if she has Facebook. She doesn't seem like the type." He retorted lowly. 

"Dude, everyone has Facebook." Johnny laughed. He sounded like a hyena on steroids. "Even Reed has an account, and you know how out of touch he is. Honestly, I don't know how you haven't already looked her up." 

"Maybe because it's creepy and I'm not a stalker?" Peter replied, though this wasn't the full truth. He had just been so busy of late that the thought hadn't crossed his mind.

"It's not stalking, it's research." Johnny reached into his pocket and pulled out the latest mobile developed by Relint; a subsidiary company owned by Stark Industries. They developed all the boring, everyday stuff like laptops and phones, except they weren't boring at all. Unlike Peter's old and battered Nokia, Reliant mobiles were constantly developing. They came equipped with almost everything you could think of. Johnny passed this extremely expensive phone to Peter. "Log into your Facebook." 

Peter hesitated to take it. Everything he ever touched seemed to break. That wasn't an exaggeration. There was a reason that he always refused to hold people's babies. "Why not just log into yours?" 

"I got banned...temporarily." 

Peter wished that he could say that this came as a surprise, but it really didn't. Johnny was completely unfiltered. He said whatever came to his mind, offensive or not, and had such a hunger for fame that he did terribly stupid things just to stay in the limelight. Once Peter even had to convince him out of the disturbing idea to star in an adult film... That's why Peter didn't ask why he got banned. He didn't want to know. Instead, he complied with Johnny's request and swiftly handed the mobile back to him before it got the chance to slip from his fingers. 

"That wasn't so hard, right?" Johnny mocked as his eyes scanned Peter's homepage. It was probably the saddest thing he had ever seen. The feed was bombarded with science pages; the first picture of a black hole, and information on new elements being added to the periodic table. Even worse was that he only had fifteen friends. Two of which were taken up by MJ's old and new accounts. Another was his Aunt May, and his childhood friend Harry Osbourne. The rest were random people from his Chemical Engineering classes. "Wow...I'd hate to see your Twitter."

"I don't have Twitter."

"Of course you don't." Johnny shook his head, and instead focused on finding Peter's new flame. "So, what's her name?"

Peter had the sudden urge to lie, just to shorten this experience by as much as possible...but any name he came up with, statistically speaking, was likely to belong to a few hundred people. Sifting through those would take even longer. "Annabelle Lee."

Johnny made a visibly amused expression at the out-of-date name, but typed it in regardless. Peter scooted closer and peered at the screen curiously. There was a relatively surprising number of results, but only two within New York. One was a woman of fifty-two, and unless she had some miracle de-aging cream, he doubted that was her. 

The second profile had a picture that made Johnny do a double take, and Peter laugh so loudly that Reed Richards could hear it from two rooms over. It was a severely altered screenshot of Captain Kirk. Not the Chris Pine version, the original William Shatner one. 

"Is...that her?" Johnny managed to choke out.

"I sure hope so." Peter said between chuckles. MJ had never been a fan of Star Trek, which was fine, but the original series held a special place in Peter's heart. He used to watch it with his Uncle Ben. 

Upon clicking onto her profile, they both found that she had no real pictures of herself. It was filled, instead, with a plethora of memes. In her information section it said that she attended the same college as Peter, and was majoring in Literature. 

"Yeah. That's gotta be her."

"Oh, so she's just as weird as you are." Johnny raised an eyebrow, still trying desperately to find a picture of her. It was no use. She wasn't even tagged in anything. "Alright. Plan B. Where does she work?" 

"No." Was Peter's quick response. "That's not happening."

"Never mind. She has it on her Facebook." Johnny grinned mischievously. "Burgatori. Sick. They have some awesome fries."

"Johnny..." Peter pleaded. He had already been tricked there by MJ a few days ago. If he went again it might look like he was following her or something. Peter panicked at the thought. "We're not going." 

—————————-

Peter stood outside of Burgatori with a frown. This wasn't a good idea, but Johnny had basically forced him to throw some civilian clothes on and dragged him out the door. He even threatened that, if Peter didn't tag along, he would tell Annabelle about that time that he ate too many Doritos and puked all over Johnny's five hundred dollar jeans. It didn't occur to Peter that Johnny still didn't know what Annabelle looked like until they had already arrived. 

"Alright, just follow my lead. I've done this tons of times. You go up to her, snap your fingers," He demonstrated, and a small flicker of fire hovered over his fingernail. "and say, 'Flame on, baby'."

Peter narrowed his eyes at his moronic friend. "Yeah, except I'm not you."

"But you get the point, right?" Johnny insisted. "Just lift up your shirt, show her that iconic blue and red suit, and watch her fall for you."

"Are you crazy?" Peter whispered harshly. "If the wrong people find out who I really am, then it'll put everyone I love in danger..." 

Johnny shrugged. "Everyone knows who I am and it's worked out pretty well for me." 

"That's because almost everyone you care about has powers." Peter argued back. This subject always got him riled up, especially with Johnny who had absolutely no idea what it was like to be responsible for the safety of others. "Your sister's the Invisible Woman, your brother-in-law is Mr. Fantastic, your roommate's The Thing, and your ex-girlfriend's Nova! MJ's powers begin and end with her looks, and my Aunt May is really good at praying. That's it. They can't fend against the people that I fight." 

Johnny exhaled heavily. "Fine, calm down. There are ways to do this without revealing that you're the king of swing." 

Peter's nose scrunched up, as if he'd just watched someone blow a spit bubble. "Ew. Don't ever call me that again."

Johnny smirked, like the douchebag that he was, and said "Which one is she?"

For the first time since they had arrived, Peter dared to glance across the road. It didn't take long to spot her. She was wiping down a few tables whilst speaking to a couple of elderly diners. She was wearing a fuzzy polka-a-dot jumper, sparkling stockings, and a skirt that fell modestly below her knees. Her hair didn't look like meatballs today. It was, instead, wrapped around her head in a moderately long plait; like a crown of brown hair. 

Peter pointed in her direction, and though she was in plain sight, Johnny squinted. "Where? I don't see anyone." 

Peter huffed. "She's right in front of you." 

Johnny gave an exaggerated shrug. This was the moment that Peter truly knew that his friend was an idiot. "All I see are a few old people and-..." He cut himself off and stared even harder in Belle's direction. "No...please tell me that's not her." 

Peter's frown only intensified at his words. "What do you mean?"

"Pete, she dresses like my great grandma. Actually, I thought she was my grandma. My dead grandma. I mean, you seriously downgraded from MJ." 

The young scientist's jaw clenched, but he didn't want to cause a scene with Annabelle so close by. "You really are an asshole."

Johnny crossed his arms, still staring at the smiling girl. "Well, on the bright side, she shouldn't be too hard to pick up." 

Peter swallowed the insults that he wanted to hiss at Johnny for teasing someone like Annabelle. He wanted to retaliate, but that would only draw more attention to them...and Peter was feeling anxious enough as it was. "Whatever, if you don't like her then that's probably a good sign. Means she's actually respectable." 

Without even trying to defend himself, or the many women he'd been with, Johnny sauntered across the road. Peter noted that he didn't wait for the pedestrian lights to turn green. 

Each step brought Johnny Storm closer to Peter's crush. He could hear her speaking to some old folks about prehistoric music that he had never heard of; like 'Little Richard' and 'The Beach Boys'. Despite this, and her obvious lack of fashion, Johnny found himself thinking that perhaps Peter wasn't completely crazy for liking her. Upon closer inspection she had a fairly decent face; big blue eyes and a smile that lit them up like two distant stars in the reflection of an ocean. Her passable appearance was buried though beneath uncountable layers of weirdness. 

Johnny cleared his throat, straightened his posture and sported the usual panty-dropping smile. "Hey, baby." 

Annabelle whipped around, much like a Meerkat caught in headlights, just as she was beginning to clear a ketchup bottle from one of the many tables. She paused for a second, allowing her mind time to register who she was seeing. It wasn't long before she realised that it was the Human Torch. 

Then a noise emanated from her throat that I, as the narrator limited to the shallow medium of text, can not replicate with necessary fidelity. It was somewhere between a screaming goat and a dying cat. Subconsciously, she squeezed the sauce bottle grasped in her hands. Ketchup splashed all over Johnny's designer jacket.

"O-Oh my god!" Annabelle gasped in absolute horror at her own actions. She swiftly placed the sauce bottle back down on the table, to which it swayed from side to side before completely toppling over, and then reached for a bundle of wipes. She immediately started rubbing at the red saucey stain, but it only seemed to be making it worse. "I'm s-so sorry Mr Torch, sir." 

Johnny, quite frankly, was in shock. Not only had his custom made jacket been smeared with a sticky condiment, but she was now trying to scrub it off with an alcohol wipe; something that was clearly only embedding the stain into his clothing. Still, Johnny knew that Peter was watching and that the web-head would get way too much joy out of watching him lose his cool. So, he tried one more time. A last ditch effort to flirt with the clueless woman. "Uh, you can...call me Johnny. Don't worry about the stain, I'm sure it'll come out..."

"Jesus Christ almighty, I can't believe I did that." The girl gulped in clear mortification, ceasing her attempts to clean off the ketchup. The wipe was pink now, and full of holes from the force she had used. That stain definitely wasn't coming out. "I really am so sorry Johnny Torch...I m-mean, Human Johnny...I mean-" 

The man finally put his hand up to silence her. Annabelle's painful babbling was too much for even him to bare. Fearing that speaking again might trigger another flurry of words to escape the clumsy waitress, he turned on his heels and slunked back over to Peter. It was hard not to see the beam of laughter that was threatening to burst onto his face. 

"So..." Peter said in a strained voice, trying desperately to keep his amusement at bay. "How'd it go?"

Johnny's expression was unreadable, but that tended to happen when your favourite thousand dollar jacket was destroyed. "She's...perfect for you."

With that, he left. Without so much as a goodbye. Johnny's mind was too preoccupied on finding a dry cleaner and asking them about sauce stains. At his departure, Peter's gaze fell back onto Annabelle who looked absolutely humiliated. Her head was in her hands, and her entire body seemed to shrink into itself. It was almost as if she were internally wishing to be swallowed up by the ground. 

Seeing Belle so distressed tugged a few familiar chords inside of Peter's chest. He knew exactly how she felt. There was rarely a day that went by when Peter didn't make a fool of himself. 

The previous fear of speaking to her slowly vanished, and instead he could think of nothing more than cheering her up. So he stepped towards the restaurant and picked up the ketchup bottle that had fallen over. "Umm...this yours?"

Annabelle's entire expression seemed to cringe at the sound of someone speaking to her after what had happened, let alone a person that she knew from college. Belle turned with pained eyes and carefully took the condiment from Peter's hands. "Y-You saw all of that?"

"N-No..." Peter lied, but it was obvious that she didn't believe him. "I mean, yeah, but it's not a big deal. Johnny's a jerk. He'll live." 

Though he had intended to ease Annabelle's stress, it only heightened it. "You're friends with the Johnny Storm? Oh my god, did I embarrass you in front of him? Or him in front of you? Or me?... I embarrassed everyone, didn't I? Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit. What am I going to do? I'll never live this down."

Belle was cute when she swore, Peter noticed, but he quickly reminded himself that this wasn't the time to be admiring his wreck of a crush. She was panicking, and the whirlwind of words coming from her mouth only became longer, and faster, and closer together. The solution was clear. Peter had to outweigh her embarrassment with his own. It was the only way. A sacrifice to be made for the good of mankind...or to erase the severe frown on Annabelle's face, which was basically the same as saving everyone on the planet because if she wasn't smiling then how was the sun going to get its light? 

Well, the technical answer was through a nuclear reaction called fusion; as atoms of hydrogen combined to form helium, they produced vast amounts of heat and light...but it would probably help if Belle was smiling. It certainly couldn't hurt the process. 

"Hey, don't worry about it. I've done a lot worse." Peter said in a hushed tone, as if this were a secret that he was entrusting to her. "Once I ate too many Doritos and puked on his jeans. He smelt like cheese for the rest of the day. The stain's still there. At least now he has a jacket to go with it."

Annabelle's mood immediately appeared to shift from self-pitying guilt to surprise. "You did?"

Peter tried not to regret his decision of telling her. It was embarrassing, but it at least gave her a break from the shame she had felt. "Yeah. I never know how many Doritos are too many until after I've already finished the whole packet. Johnny tends to steer clear of me whenever I eat around him now." 

There was a moment, however brief, in which the remnants of a smile flickered onto Belle's face. She had a pretty smile. Prettier than even MJ's. "I've...done that too."

That sentence suspended in the air around them. Peter stared at her, searching for any indication that this was a lie, but he knew that it wasn't. Honestly, who the hell would lie about something like that anyway? 

"You've gone into Dorito overload as well?" Peter asked, just to confirm that he had heard her correctly. She nodded, and Peter fell into awe. She liked Doritos. She liked Doritos so much that she'd vomited from eating too many. If there truly was a god, you know...besides Thor, then this was substantial evidence that he existed.


	5. Chapter Five: The Pumpkin King

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Spider-Man must face another terrifying enemy, the Jack O’ Lantern...but what would usually be a quick fight turns into a dangerous one when Protonslaught shows up.

Imagine this, a young pair of university students kicking back on the couch eating Doritos until they puke and watching 'Hercules in New York'. Arnold Schwarzenegger's first movie ever by the way. It was terrible. He was terrible. So terrible in fact, that they dubbed him over with some other guy because you could barely understand a single word he was saying. It's true, you should look it up. Anyway, that image was perfect, at least it was for Peter who had been staring at Anabelle Lee for a solid minute or so. 

The woman in question furrowed her brow, and Peter was sent into one of his all too common panics. Was he being creepy? Well, he hadn't spoken for exactly 95 seconds which seemed a few seconds too long for a normal, 'not creepy' conversation. He could try and say something now...but then it would sound awkward and forced and Anabelle would probably move away to some secluded island just to ensure that she never endured his awkwardness again.

Suddenly, as if acting in direct response to Peter's pathetic internal prayers, there was a rumbling that seeped through the ground which was accompanied by the sound of a tremendous explosion. Peter, feeling blessed by this act of divine intervention, glanced over his shoulder towards the direction of the commotion. 

The young man was then patron to a whirling roller coaster of emotion as his feeling of relief was instantaneously replaced by an eye-widening call to arms; a maniac riding a broomstick trailed through the sky, hurling explosive pumpkins at the street below. The gut-wrenching assumption made by Peter that this was the Green Goblin was also quickly denied when he spied that this guy's head was a flaming pumpkin. The latest climb in Peter's erratic emotional journey was the realisation that this criminal, the Jack O'Lantern, was a complete loser and sucked real bad so he could easily punch his ass into next week and come back in time to stare at Anabelle some more. Not in a weird way. Obviously. Because Peter Parker was not a weird guy, no siree. 

His bug-eyed gaze shot back to Anabelle as he declared much too loudly in a stressed tone "UM I HAVE TO GO CATCH MY BUS."

Anabelle instantly blurted "I HAVE TO GO TO THE BATHROOM. I...I DON'T KNOW WHY I TOLD YOU THAT."

"COOL. SEE YOU LATER."

"BYE."

Peter took off like a proverbial lightning bolt because yes he was fast, but he wasn't Quicksilver fast and still had to maintain the meticulous illusion that he was a loser science nerd with the physical capacities of a six year-old. Once he rounded a corner into an alleyway, he leapt onto the wall and scaled it like...well...a spider. You didn't come here for creativity, you came here for SPIDERS. 

Speaking of spiders, it took the blink of an eye for the eternal loser Peter Parker to re-emerge as the Spectacular Spider-Man. This time it's Spectacular. Next time maybe Friendly-Neighbourhood or Amazing. He kept a list of the ones he liked. The wall-crawler leapt off the rooftop and rocketed straight for the path of an incoming pumpkin bomb. Using his trusty trigger fingers and far-too-extensive knowledge of physics, Spidey fired a web line at the explosive device, twirled it once, then let it go off into the sky.

A split second later, the bomb detonated in a cloud of red embers. "I thought the giant flaming pumpkin head was cool but stealing the pumpkin bomb thing was a bit much. I mean you're the second person to try ripping ol' Gobby off."

Jack O' Lantern ceased his flight path and took this time not to actually throw some more bombs at the webhead, but instead engage in a super-villain speech. "You...! I've been waiting for you, Spider-Man!"

"I feel like we know each other a little too well for you to be calling me by my full-name. It's a little...overly formal. Spidey is fine."

"I don't care! I've finally got you where I want you! And by the way, the pumpkin bombs were just a coincidence!"

With that, the living Halloween decoration hurled another bomb at Spidey, who simply rinsed and repeated his last tactic with ease. The bomb exploded harmlessly in the sky. "Oh. So you designed the head first, then just went with it without making sure it wasn't too similar to someone else? I mean...I could've called myself Ant-Man but I actually did some research. Well, that would've been kinda stupid because I was bitten by this crazy radioactive spider thing."

"How the hell was I meant to know that Green Goblin and Hobgoblin made their bombs look like pumpkins? That makes no sense! What links goblins and pumpkins?!" Jack once again attacked Peter with a thrown bomb. 

At this point, Peter was getting a bit tired of this. He threw the stupid bomb away, then said "You know, that's a good point. What's up with that?"

"Well they're both pretty SPOOKY." Said a woman's voice at Spidey's side.

Peter glanced at the source of the stupid remark and was forced to sigh in exasperation. "Why? Why is it always you? And with the losers I can fight on my own?"

Wow, what a surprise, it was Protonslaught! Who could've guessed, considering the fact that she was introduced not that long ago, left pretty quickly, and had conflict with our webbed hero that could be used for the build-up of dramatic tension? She kinda just stood there proudly for a second before saying "You could not take this guy. You suck."

Jack nodded in approval as he floated with the aid of his broomstick. "Yeah man, you suck!" He snarled.

Peter shook his head. "What is this, the Daily Bugle? I get enough of this crap every other day of my life. You know what? Screw this."

With that, with one thrust of his legs, he propelled himself three storeys into the air to match Jack's height, reached out and violently snatched his satchel of pumpkin bombs. In another swift motion, Peter tossed them into the nearby river, spun and kicked Jack in the face. 

Those bombs, since they were totally just ripped off from the Hobgoblin's ones, weren't designed to work in water. The circuitry would get all soupy and short out, meaning that this wall-crawling hero just engaged in some explosive ordnance disposal. Before he landed , Spidey sent out a web line, swung on it, and zipped into Jack with a punch.

This blow sent the bad guy zooming backwards on his broom. Peter landed atop a streetlight, bracing for when Jack would recover from these blows and return the favour.

However, Spidey's trusty ally Protonslaught had other ideas. As the webspinner stared down Jack, he saw a plastic bag slowly but surely drift up from the street and gently fall onto his face. Peter, in utter disbelief, glanced down at the woman. "...Seriously, what do you even do?"

"Shut the hell up, you inbred asshat!" 

If it wasn't for his Spider-Sense, Peter may have been struck in the head by the suddenly-appearing bowling ball that zipped mere inches away from his face. In outrage, he threw his hands up in the air as the bowling ball totally smashed some random dude's car window. "Hey! What's the matter with you?!"

"What's the matter with me? What's the matter with you!?" She called back.

The thing is, Peter's Spider-Sense worked most of the time. Sometimes, if he was distracted, it would feel like it came on a little too late. Oh, why is this information being relayed to you right now at this seemingly random interval, you say? Because this was one of those times, silly. 

A blinding light consumed Peter's vision, and a hot mess of an impact slammed into his chest. Seeing as his costume provided no real protection and was a glorified onesie, whenever Spidey sustained damage in a fight, it was always a testament to his superhuman durability that he didn't die for not wearing some padding at the very least. 

He was propelled off the streetlight with velocity that would've broken bones in any human person, and into the brick wall, behind him. Peter, despite the pain he felt, managed to latch onto the surface and recover within seconds. Gritting his teeth in frustration, Spidey simply splashed a layer of webbing right into Jack O'Lantern's eyes and resumed his berating of Protonslaught.

"Hey. You seriously need to knock this off. If I was anybody else, I could've died from that." Peter scalded.

Protonslaught had her attention on the stream of pebbles, streamers, apples, rubber balls, branches, and crow bars that poured forth from her hands and bounced off Jack's writhing form. "Just shut up for a sec, I'm trying to focus here."

If he'd been the kind of person that maybe didn't respect the responsibility that came with great power, it was probable that he would've dropped down there and punched that chick in the face. But of course, he had a lot of respect for responsibility. 

Biting his tongue, Peter just zipped back towards Jack O'Lantern and laid a hefty jab onto his face. With a scream, Jack snapped backwards as his helmet cracked from the force. Spidey perched onto Jack's broomstick and was ready to finish this fight...until his Spider-Sense went off again.

Using a great deal of his physical strength, he wrenched the broomstick to the side, sending both he and Jack O'Lantern spinning away from whatever his sixth sense was warning him about. 

As they spun free of the danger, Peter's eyes widened when they fell onto...a tree. A massive, thick oak tree that sprouted out of the concrete. At its base was Protonslaught, who was scratching her head.

Spidey glanced into the sky and his heart stopped dead. This tree seemed to grow to full size instantly...meaning that if Protonslaught materialised it underneath something, it was launched into the sky with incredible force. Peter saw a car spinning in the air, and heard terrified screams in the distance. "Oh my god!" Spidey gasped.

Before he could throw himself into action, Jack, like the sneaky, honourless scumbag he is, thrusted a concealed blade into Spidey's gut. The pain landed up Peter's side, but he didn't stop for a second. He pushed Jack's blade outward, then dropped off the broom.

The wallcrawler fired a web strand from each hand, both latching onto buildings on opposite sides of the street. He pushed backwards, stretching and tensing the webs. Then, using them as a slingshot, Peter was fired through the sky like a missile, with the car growing in size upon his approach. 

In less than a second, he slammed against the top of the vehicle and affixed himself to it. Now is where more of his seemingly useless physics knowledge came in handy. Right then, the occupied car was spinning out of control; the motion was shaking the people inside around like clothes in a dryer, so they could get hurt real bad. All Peter had to do was apply a counterforce depending on which direction the car was spinning, and he could negate this tumble which would make it safer for the guys inside, and also make it easier for him to catch it before it hits the ground.

The webhead scurried over the side of the sedan and onto the bottom of it, all the while observing how the world around him was spinning and taking note of the growing cityscape. Spidey braced his legs and pushed off the left side of the undercarriage. This thrust sent him several metres away from the vehicle, slightly slowed its descent, and corrected its chaotic spins. 

Peter somersaulted, landed on the concrete, then extended his hands into the air. "Oh boy. This is gonna hurt."

The four-door sedan dropped onto Spider-Man, who growled in pain as the impact sent him dropping to one knee. He braced the car on his back as he powered through the strain, and carefully laid it onto the road. There was a woman in the driver's seat and a man in the passenger seat; both looked understandably freaked out. "Are you guys okay?" Peter asked urgently.

They both nodded erratically, the woman muttering "Oh God...thank you, Spider-Man...!" 

Peter's hands were curled into fists as he turned around and sent his attention to Protonslaught. She stared in utter disbelief; completely motionless. "I-I...didn't mean to do that." 

"You're out of control!" Spidey snapped as he grasped his bleeding wound.

Jack, who finally peeled the layers of webbing from his face, interjected "What? What's going on? Are you talking to me?"

Protonslaught retorted "No, you idiot."

"Oh. Okay." Jack replied. "This is getting a little...heated. I might just...go."

As the pumpkin-headed criminal was about to zoom off with his broomstick, an unannounced blow struck the device and stunned Jack. A circular object bounded off the broom, bounced off a traffic light post, and into the trained hand of Captain America, who stood tall in the middle of the street. "Now where do you think you're going, son?" 

Protonslaught clearly hadn't met anyone on Cap's level before...and you could easily tell that she was starstruck. "Holy shit, it's Captain America!" She bellowed.

Jack O'Lantern froze. He muttered "C-Captain America!? N-No, not Cap! He's gonna kick my ass!" As Jack was desperately trying to get his broomstick under control, Cap ran towards the bleeding Spidey. "Spider-Man...you need a medic?" He asked worriedly. 

"I-I'm fine Cap...look, this just hasn't been my day. I should be able to turn this joker into toast...but my hands've been full."

Steve smiled triumphantly, and the gesture alone managed to help Peter out of his rut. "Hey, stow that talk. We'll finish this together." He extended a hand for a shake. Peter, the anger and frustration cooled for now thanks to Cap's naturally inspirational aura, firmly squeezed his friend's hand. 

This was a beautiful moment. Spidey had his favourite ninety year old super soldier to thank for steeling his resolve. So, like every other good thing in Peter Parker's life, it wasn't to last. "Holy FUCKING shit! C-Captain! O Captain!" Protonslaught cried as she came closer.

Cap's determined stare dropped into a confused glaze as the woman came to a stop inches away from him. "Foul language is the mark of a small vocabulary, miss."

"Oh. Right. Sorry. I'm just a big fan. Of freedom. A-And democracy. My favourite thing to read is the Declaration of Independence."

Peter swiftly inserted himself between Cap and Protonslaught, eyes narrowing at her. "Steve, this grade-A idiot almost got two civilians killed just now. She needs to leave and let us handle this."

"Hey shut the fuck up, Jizz-Hands Man."

"Are you serious? You got me bombed, threw a bunch of innocent people into the sky, and that's all you have to say?" Peter snarled.

Protonslaught planted her hands on her hips. "Ha! Look at that, you got stabbed."

Captain Rogers' voice boomed through the city like a clap of thunder "That's enough." For the first time since Peter met her, Protonslaught was made speechless. Her eyes seemed to shimmer in Cap's presence. "Whatever happened between you two, it needs to be put on hold. Right now, that maniac needs to be put behind bars. Are you going to start working together, or do I have to do this myself?"

Peter sighed, stood a little straighter, then said "I've got your back, Cap."

The Sentinel of Liberty then glanced over to Protonslaught, with eyes filled with mild annoyance. She swallowed then said "Aye, aye, Captain."

"Oh for crying out loud—" Peter started, only to be cut off by the sound of Jack's cackling in the distance.

The discount Hobgoblin was trailing off on his broomstick as he shouted "You guys suck! Oh and thanks for fighting Nazis back in World War II Cap! I'm pretty scummy but Nazis are just plain evil!"

Instantly, Cap was in his element. "Engage pursuit! I'll cut him off!" The Super Soldier scaled a nearby building by pulling himself up using windows, pipes, and fire escapes. Faster than any human could, Steve Rogers sprinted down the rooftops like a cheetah.

Peter didn't spare another second. He swung through the busy New York streets, following Jack O'Lantern's smoke trail. Soon enough, Protonslaught appeared by Spidey's side. She flew through the air with all the grace of an injured penguin.

They trailed Jack for a while, with Peter glad that he confiscated his little bag of tricks so innocent people were no longer at risk. Every now and then, Jack would peer over his shoulder and have a little panic attack whenever he saw his pursuers closing on him.

At one such moment, a man coloured much like the United States of America, threw himself from the top of an apartment block with his shield raised. The circular plate of vibranium slammed into Jack's rib cage, causing him to squeal in pain.

Cap arced down into the street and rolled to a landing. "Hit him now!" He commanded.

"I got it!" Protonslaught yelled.

Spidey felt an incredible stabbing pain in his stomach. "No, don't!!" He urged.

Protonslaught raised her hands, and instead of a nuclear warhead coming out of it, there was only a steady jet of water. The liquid sprayed over Jack O'Lantern's head, extinguishing his flame. The man hesitantly patted his head "Woah, woah, is my hair out?"

In this momentary lapse in concentration, the bewildered pumpkin man didn't anticipate the traffic light that was going to smack into his pumpkin face in less than a second. When it came, Peter winced in sympathy pains.

Jack fell from his broomstick and onto a concrete plaza with a 'crack'. 

"Jesus...!" Spidey yelped, dropping out of the sky. He landed by Jack's side, eager to see whether or not the loser was dead.

Jack writhed in pain. "My back...my back...." There came a popping sound, much like stressed vertebrae clicking. "My back...! I can...still wiggle my toes so that's a good sign. Am I still...going to jail?"

"Yes." Snapped Spider-Man.

"Oh. It was worth a try."

Protonslaught hovered in, roaring triumphantly. "That's right! I beat him! You suck, Jizz-Hands Man!"

The innocent civilians in the area were...let's say appalled by her language. Captain America promptly arrived on the scene. "That was reckless and dangerous." He said, scalding Protonslaught.

"W-What?" She asked.

"You could've crippled this man for life. And apparently...you put Spider-Man and two other civilians in needless danger. You're a juvenile and, quite frankly, a liability. You need to quit while you're ahead." Lectured Rogers.

Protonslaught seemed to be hurt by these words for a second, until she blinked several times and wore a nonchalant pout. "Right. You just can't keep up, old man. Neither can you, bug-boy."

Cap's eyes narrowed. "Don't you see how careless you're being?"

"You can shove it, Uncle Sam." Growled the woman as she took off into the air.

With the adrenaline worn off, Spidey was starting to feel the aching of his injuries. Regardless, he cocked his head and said something stupid "The bar for being a superhero is getting a little low nowadays, ain't it?"

"What exactly happened?" Cap asked as he wrapped an arm around Peter and led him away from the crowd as the police arrived to incarcerate Jack O'Lantern.

"Well...first she distracted me by almost throwing a bowling ball at my head, which gave Jack a chance to throw a grenade at me. Then, she...catapulted an occupied car twenty metres into the sky by flash growing a tree underneath it. I had to catch it...and that kinda hurt. Oh and Jack stabbed me."

Steve shook his head. "Unbelievable. You need medical attention; I'll take you to Avengers Tower...give you a once over."

"N-Nah I'll be fine. I'm sure you've got more important things to deal with."

"That's an order, son. And there isn't a thing more important than looking after your own."

Peter sighed, and reluctantly agreed "...Thanks Steve...that chick just really irks me."


	6. Chapter Six: Consider the Coconut

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Crime never sleeps, but not every criminal is a large scale threat...

Attending college lectures sounds easy enough in theory, but there were a dozen little things between waking up and actually arriving on campus that always prevented Peter from getting there on time. Getting out of bed was the hardest part. Peter often found himself complaining out loud whenever his alarm went off...to no one but himself, of course. He lived alone after all, in a damp apartment that smelt like condensation and looked like it was a few days from falling apart completely. 

Then there was breakfast, and by breakfast Peter meant two cans of energy drink that he snagged from Johnny's place. What? It was totally nutritious and absolutely not going to give him a heart attack one day. Spiders don't have heart attacks. They probably don't even have hearts at all...just a massive black hole full of evil thoughts and replacement legs in case they ever lost one. Speaking of which, Peter had noticed how spiders always seemed to lose a leg. He unfortunately saw tons of them in his apartment under all the junk that he couldn't find the time to clean up. There were seven-legged spiders, a few five-legged, and there was one with only four limbs that he had spotted just yesterday, but eight? Nope. None, and if he ever found one, losing a leg wasn't going to be their primary concern. A giant shoe to their little hairy body would be. Peter hated spiders, as ironic as that sounded.

Stepping away from the subject of small insects, and towards bugs more...human-sized; next Peter had to find the mental strength to throw on his Spider-man suit. Have you ever swung around midtown in a tight-fitting outfit fighting off horde's of bad guys? Well, the sweat tends to stick and Peter didn't own a washing machine. Yes, it was kind of gross, but people were natural slobs and Peter Parker was no exception. He was only able to clean this costume once every week or so when his Aunt May volunteered at the homeless shelter (he'd have to sneak in like some common burglar to use her washing machine). She still didn't know about his alter ego, and he wanted to keep it that way. 

Peter pulled the mask over his face, internally wishing that he hadn't opted for one that covered his mouth and prevented any fresh air from reaching him, then dove out of his window. A few web-swinging seconds later and he was shooting through the winding streets of New York. His destination was a tall building right across the street from his college campus; on the roof of which he kept his school bag and civilian clothes. 

Why, you may ask? Well, because walking to school like everyone else had eventually become an unrealistic task. He would always run into trouble, and when he did he'd have to find a secluded place to throw off his normal clothes and hide his school supplies. This only ever succeeded in making him even later, for both class and the ass-whooping. Carrying the bag on his back as Spider-Man was also a no-go. It would tip people off about the age group he belonged to. So the only solution was to keep his bag near the campus, arrive there as Spidey, then leave as Peter Parker. 

The morning was relatively crime-free this time, though. He saw a few jaywalkers and cars that were going slightly over the speed limit; but these weren't his battles to fight. He was instead looking forward to actually arriving on time for his lecture on Chemical Thermodynamics, and then to finally attend his tutorial with Annabelle. Peter swooned in mid-air and almost forgot to make himself a new web. He swung too close to the walkway and heard a few gasps as people jumped out of his way. 

"S-Sorry!" Spider-Man yelled out, waving sheepishly at the crowd who still looked relatively shocked by him almost tumbling into them.

Peter huffed, setting his sights back on the horizon. He could almost see her face fading into it like one of those memorial posters. He remembered more clearly now than ever before that she always smelled like a bakery. Not flowers, or vanilla, or any of that boring stuff. Annabelle smelt like fresh food; as if she spent her days going from place to place just eating their best dishes...or, you know, it could also be because she worked in a restaurant. Either way, she smelt good. Peter meant that in a totally not weird way, but there was no way to tell her that without sounding like a creep. 

It was easy back a few centuries ago, you'd just write them some corny poem and they'd fall head over heels. Now, though, there was no way of knowing whether they'd enjoy something that cheesy, or if they were lactose intolerant.

Amidst such a riveting inner monologue, Peter almost missed the police officers standing on the side of the street; they had just set up some yellow tape around a large Palm tree that Spidey, quite honestly, couldn't remember ever seeing there before. It was like it grew overnight or something...

Like an incredibly talented ballerina, the web-head vaulted off his webline, hurtled towards a street light pole next to the cops who looked rather exhausted, then grasped himself against it. The cops all jolted when he landed and said, out of breath, "H-Hey...guys... Is everything okay?"

At that point, the wall crawler began to spy a dozen or so smashed coconuts splayed all over the floor.

The three cops glanced at each other. "Hey don't look at me, you're the ranking officer." One murmured.

This ranking officer in question, ran a hand down his face and sighed. "U-Uh....well..." He then pointed up at the palm tree. Peter turned his attention towards this vegetable monolith, and in the corner of his eye, spied an object hurtling toward his face at the speed of an average baseball pitch. 

A coconut bounced off Spider-Man's head. And yes, many of you may say 'whatever, Spidey has like super durability or some shit'. Kind of. He isn't that tough. He's slightly meatier than your average guy, but that's about it. He could still stub his toe on a coffee table like every other human being, and now the arachnid had a massive bump right under his hairline.

"OW! OH GOD...OW...!" Peter whelped, sliding down the pole and onto his feet.

The lead police officer rubbed the back of his head. "Wait...aren't you meant to have that spider-sense thing?"

"It only works for life-threatening danger." Spidey explained.

"A coconut isn't life threatening? Those things can kill, man."

Peter looked back up at the palm tree and saw a figure huddled atop the leaves. "COCONUTS TO YOU!!"

Spidey looked to the floor.

"Uh...Spidey? You okay?"

The webslinger shook his head. He didn't think that he'd have to deal with something like this today. "I should've stayed in bed this morning..."

The third cop cocked his head. "So who is this guy...?"

Spider-Man sighed, and as his eyes wandered back up the unimpressive palm tree, he saw a familiar face grinning down at him from the very top. "Plantman. He...controls plants. Only ever seems to make trees though."

The ranking officer's brow furrowed. "Why's that?"

Another coconut flew passed their heads and Spider-Man exhaled heavily. "I don't know. He's insane." 

"What's the hold up?" Another voice permeated through the air; Spider-Man and each of the three cops glanced in the direction it had come from. Standing there, behind the yellow tape, was the large frame of Luke Cage. He was holding bags full of groceries in either hand. 

"Plantman." The webhead replied in an almost bored monotone. Not every day can be extra terrestrial battles for Earth...sometimes you just had to deal with a weirdo and his coconuts. 

"Aww come on. Not again." Luke groaned in irritation and dropped his shopping on the ground. He stepped over the tape, then marched closer to the giant sapling. "Get your ass down here, Sam!" 

The man in the tree ducked back under the bright green leaves and wailed "No!" 

"Don't you make me come up there!" 

There was a temporary silence. Peter hated those. Somehow, he always needed to burp when it got quiet. Luckily for him that atmosphere was swiftly broken when Samuel, aka Plantman, hurled another hard-shelled drupe to the ground. Luke caught it in mid-air, almost too easily, and glared up at its point of origin. 

"I swear to Jesus if you don't get down here right now, I'll peg this at you so hard it'll make your head spin." Luke exclaimed even louder than before. 

As entertaining as this scene was, Peter jumped back onto the traffic pole and saluted his friend's valiant attempts to stop the coconut-wielding menace. "Well, looks like you've got everything handled. I'm already late so I gotta get going."

Luke frowned, and that expression fell into outrage when he saw Peter leap over to his shopping bags and snag a pack of beef jerky from inside. "Hey! Don't you dare! That's my jerky, man." 

"A-Ah sorry, I can't hear you with the...mask and everything." Peter chuckled anxiously then sprinted away from the scene like the food stealing villain that he had become.

Okay, so maybe he shouldn't have taken Luke Cage's beef jerky...but that's what being a poor college student will do to you. It makes you crazy. Seriously, Peter's seen at least twenty people have a mental breakdown in the campus library. What do you call people that are ripping out chunks of their hair and crying over massive textbooks? Crazy. Being a college student was a real condition. 

Upon finally arriving at his destination, the first thing Peter did was get changed into his civilian clothes and open that jerky. He grabbed about four at once and bit into them with a groan of satisfaction. It was safe to say that Peter was in a much better mood as he strolled across the road with that packet in his hand. He had most definitely missed his lecture, but that tutorial with Annabelle was probably still within reach. 

He rushed to building 5, room 20, and managed to find a seat right next to the door so that barely anyone noticed him coming in. Peter leaned against the back of his chair and took a large inhale through his nose; pleased to have finally made it almost on time for a class. Now the only task remaining was to find Annabelle and waste the hour away just staring at her. Again, not in a creepy way. If there was one thing that Peter Parker wasn't, it was creepy. Right? Right. 

He scanned the room, mostly trying not to appear too suspicious. There was one girl biting her nails, and a guy that looked either asleep or dead; but no Annabelle. Now that he got a closer look, he didn't recognise anyone in this room...not even the professor. 

"UFO sightings happen all over the world," The tutor said in a voice akin to pork crackling, don't ask how, it just was. "but today we're going to break that down and ask ourselves 'what else could it be?'. A cloud formation, a test missile, or are aliens really visiting us?" 

Oh god, no. This wasn't his class, it was 'Close Encounters of a Multidisciplinary Kind'. A unit that Peter had always thought was absolutely and completely ridiculous. I mean, of course aliens are real. Had they not heard of Captain Marvel or the Kree? It wasn't even an argument anymore, and yet some people still insisted on maintaining the belief that it was all an illusion. It was usually slated right after his literature class. This was when he finally, for the first time that day, let his eyes wander up to the clock on the opposite wall. His expression fell into disarray. He wasn't just late...he had missed his lesson entirely. 

To add salt to this fresh wound, as he tried to sneak back out of this classroom, he kicked his shoe against the metal leg of his desk and earned the attention of every single person. Their beady little eyes stared at him like dozens of beetles. That was his cue to sprint away, hearing the loud snorted laughter of the students left behind. He ran for so long that in no time at all he was off his main campus, and dashing towards the less prestigious college next door. 

Suddenly, without any warning from his so-called 'Spidey-sense', he tripped and went crashing down the pathway. He didn't know how to explain it. One moment he was running, with his shoes pounding against the ground, and the next he was in mid-air with his arms flailing around like a confused and flightless goose. 

"Have a nice fall, dickwad?" The voice of the dumbest person in the universe spoke, and Peter wasn't surprised to turn around and find Flash Thompson standing behind him. His foot was sticking out slightly, almost guaranteeing that he had been the one that tripped Peter. 

Peter sighed but didn't bother getting back up from his new home in the asphalt because Flash would likely just push him back down; and he'd have to pretend like he couldn't dodge it. Peter didn't understand why his senses hadn't warned him about this. How did they not perceive Flash as a threat?! He was massive! I mean, absolutely ginormous by normal mortal standards. He was a jock, after all, and not to use stereotypes...but he only got into college because of his football scholarship. 

Peter had thought that once he got into college that he'd be rid of Flash, only to discover that his High School bully had been accepted into the university next to his...that may sound like a once in a lifetime coincidence, but it was just the Peter Parker luck. Nothing ever went right. He did manage to somehow keep hold of his beef jerky though...that was a positive. 

Flash left with a laugh that boomed around Peter, almost as if it had been playing on loud speakers just to taunt him. The science major waited on the ground for the jock to vanish out of sight, but before he could jump back to his feet a slender, ink-stained hand reached out towards him. Peter choked on the air from his own lungs. He'd recognise that hand anywhere. 

"That guy always trips you when you go this way." Annabelle said in her husky tone. "Are you alright?" 

Peter glanced up in humiliation. He had wanted nothing more than to see her today...but not like this; with his face buried in the concrete and a lump on his head from that damned coconut. Peter was reluctant, but he certainly wasn't going to miss the opportunity of holding her hand in a completely natural setting. 

Perhaps a little too eagerly, he grabbed her hand and heaved himself back upright with a goofy grin on his face. Her touch felt like it was destroying and remaking the atoms around him; like it could either kill him or give him life...or some other poetic rubbish. Who cares. Her hand was holding his, and Peter was so giddy with excitement that every ounce of intelligence had fled from his mind. Truly, it had. If someone were to ask him what Chemical Engineering was at this moment, he'd probably tell them that it was a cooking major or something. 

"Uhh...Peter?" Annabelle's brow furrowed and Peter's heart hammered like that of a teenage girl at a Finn Wolfhard concert...he was a singer, right? Peter hadn't been too involved in the latest music trends or tv shows. All he knew was that young girls really liked him. 

"Oh, yeah, sorry." Peter internally sulked as Annabelle moved her hand away. "I'm fine. How was class? Did I miss anything?" 

"We were just talking about one of the readings." Annabelle shrugged as if this unit was the easiest thing in the world to her. "A Midsummer Night's Dream. Have you finished it yet?" 

Peter gulped nervously. He hadn't even bothered to look at the primary readings, but he wasn't about to tell her that. Especially not after discovering her passion for Shakespeare. "Of course. It's a work of genius." 

"Isn't it, though? I love how he uses his poetic language to create melodramatic moments that both reinforce and mock the play's central theme of romantic love." Annabelle's eyes lit up at the subject... God, how was Peter meant to concentrate when she looked at him like that? "We spoke specifically about Oberon's scene in act 2. 'Quite overcanopied with luscious woodbine, with sweet musk-roses and with eglantine.' It's beautifully written, how he reveals his tender feelings for the queen even as he plans to manipulate and humiliate her."

Okay, if Peter's mind was blank before then it was practically nonexistent now. He had no clue what she was talking about, but she smelt like cheesecake today and that must've been more important than anything else. Her hair was twisted into about eight small top knots, and her dress was blindingly yellow with hand drawn flowers and puppies. People stared at her as if she'd escaped from a mental institution. 

"What do you think about it?" Annabelle suddenly asked and this managed to snap Peter out of his daze, then right into a quiet panic. 

"Uh... I think it's really cool how, yeah, he's gonna betray her and stuff." Peter mentally cursed himself for not just telling the truth. It was too late for that now though. "Basically everything you said." 

Annabelle blinked. Shit! She knew he was lying, didn't she? No one blinks like that without suspicion. Who even blinks anymore anyway? He was caught. It was over. She'd never even look at him again. "Yeah? Cool."

Peter's breath hitched. That was it?...okay, well maybe he had overreacted a little. 

"I've got to get to work, but it was nice seeing you Pete. Don't skip class next week." Annabelle waved, and the colourful bracelet around her wrist jingled. 

"O-Oh I didn't-" Before he could even get the words out she was gone. "skip..."

Peter finally let out the breath that he had been holding in, then as if for some poorly constructed plot device, his mobile vibrated in his pocket. Peter fumbled to get it out, and when he did it took a further minute or so to get the damn thing to stop glitching. The name 'Harry' flashed across his screen and Peter scrambled to open the message. 

It had been far too long since he'd heard from his best friend, and he had started to worry. There were a few times that he had even dropped in at Harry's penthouse but he was never home. The text read 'Sorry, Pete! Been a bit busy. Oscorps been working me to an early grave. I got a day off today though. Come over.'

That sounded more like a demand than a request, but it had never been possible to refuse Harry of anything anyway. One of the showcases of growing up rich, Peter supposed. Not that it mattered. Peter was all too happy to visit him in his massive home full of expensive food, a personal chef, and old pinball machines. After all, what are friends for?


	7. Chapter Seven: This is Garbage

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Peter Fonda time to visit his old friend, Harry Osborn, but when he returns home he finds that even taking out the garbage is a hardship when your name’s Peter Parker.

Anything more than a one-room apartment was a mansion to Peter Parker. So whenever he set foot inside Harry Osborn's penthouse, he could've sworn that he had perished and was dropped at the gates of heaven itself. There were leather chairs. Several of them, might I add. All encircling this really fancy and long wooden table that would make Peter's heart fail immediately if he was ever told how much it cost. It was wood. How expensive is wood? Any idiot off the street could nail four legs to a plank and make a table. Why should this slightly shinier one cost five hundred percent more? And that, ladies and gentlemen, was an example of how being rich was absolutely beyond Peter's understanding.

Not that he wouldn't like to be rich, 'cause he would. He'd love to spend thousands of dollars on a coffee machine as easily as his Aunt May buys groceries with coupons. He also wanted to earn it, and that was the problem. Peter was so busy being Spider-Man that he rarely had any time to focus on starting his own career...or passing college, for that matter. 

Peter spotted Harry pacing on the other end of the room. His best friend looked over at him, smiled, then pointed to the cell phone that was pressed against his ear. Apparently, he was in the middle of a call. So much for having a day off...

"No problem, Clancy. We're 3 points up so that can wait until the meeting this Tuesday. I need you to round up the best marketing guys and prepare a campaign for the new projects coming up. How about Friday? Is Friday okay with you, man?" Harry chirped incredibly cheerfully into the phone. 

Peter just kind of stood there, unslinging his backpack and holding it in his arms like a baby. The mild-mannered science nerd shuffled over to the way-too-big dining table and lowered himself into the nearest seat. 

"How's the family? Oh yeah? So exciting, man. They grow up so fast don't they?" Harry replied with an obviously feigned amount of interest in this random dude's family. 

There was this bowl of fruit on the table. Who does that? Who has a bowl of fruit on the table like that? Aside from Ikea catalogues? Why? These questions refracted across the inside of Peter's skull as he reached for an apple. However, due to the stupid table being so stupidly big, Peter's grasp extended further than he could reach. His clumsy fingers pushed down against the rim of the bowl.

The sound that followed would've been an epic drum solo if it wasn't like thirteen pieces of fruit bouncing off the table and onto the marble floor tiles. Peter's eyes widened as he curled his bottom lip inward. 

Harry slowly turned to Peter and glanced at him with a look that was the exact opposite of surprised. His eyes darted to the floor, at each piece of fruit, then back at Peter. An amused smirk drew itself across his perfectly handsome face. "Uh it was nothing, Clancy. Probably a cat rummaging around in the alley outside." He quipped mischievously.

Peter would've retorted with the fact that they were currently in a penthouse about fifty storeys up if Harry's phone call wasn't very obviously important. Instead, Peter opted for gathering the plethora of spilt fruit and piling them all back into the bowl. 

"Great. See you Friday." Harry said before finally tucking the mobile into his suit pocket and turning to greet his childhood friend. His radiant smile wavered slightly at the sight of the fruit bowl. "Did you just put all that dirty fruit back in the bowl?"

Peter shrugged. "Yeah?"

"That's disgusting." Harry gave an amused huff and reached over to grab the dish. "It's been on the floor, Pete." 

"So? Ever heard of the five second rule?" 

Harry chuckled. "It's the three second rule, actually."

"Yeah, with your bank account I suppose it is." Peter quipped with a grin. Personally, he never wasted food. Not even if it fell on the floor, or in the dirt...or even in a puddle. He would just wash it off, and in his mind it was perfectly safe to eat. That might sound disgusting, but hey, Pete was too poor to consider throwing things away. "It'll be fine. They look clean enough." 

Harry shook his head in disbelief and sauntered towards the fancy bin he kept in the corner of the room. It literally opened when it sensed him stepping towards it, I mean, how cool is that? Peter was convinced that owning that bin in particular was a sign that someone had reached maximum wealth. 

Peter jumped over and snatched the fruit bowl before it could be wasted. "There are starving people in Africa, man...in fact, there's starving people in this room right now. Namely me. I'll take it if you won't have it." 

"Fine, but don't come crying to me when it makes you sick." Harry watched curiously as Peter wandered back over to his backpack and poured the fruit inside, resting the empty bowl back on the table afterwards. "Seriously though, are you alright? I mean money-wise? Because I'm happy to help-"

"I'm fine." Peter quickly lied. Uncle Ben had taught him from a young age to never accept something that he didn't earn; with so many wealthy friends willing to help, these morals seemed to be the only things keeping him poor...but Peter didn't mind. He preferred the idea of making his own way in life. "I don't want your money, Harry."

"I know. You never did." Harry patted his friend on the shoulder with a smile. "That's why you're my best friend, but I still want to help. I looked your apartment up on street view. It's a hole, man."

"Didn't realise you stalk people, Harry." Peter laughed. 

"Well, I wanted to visit but not without knowing which area you were living in now. Remember your last apartment? I almost got mugged four times just trying to walk from my car to the door...which was parked on the curb in front of it." 

Peter could remember that day all too clearly. It was a Saturday, and he was inside sketching in one of his college books (a potato with a hat, to be specific). Harry had burst in with a look of absolute rage on his face, and droplets of blood running down his clenched fist. Apparently he had knocked Peter's neighbour out cold after he had threatened Harry with a knife. Yeah... Peter moved out pretty quickly after that. "It builds character." 

"Does it? Well that must be the reason you're so broke then. You're always getting robbed." 

"Nah." Peter dismissed with a short wave of his hand. "Number one rule of not getting mugged; don't have anything worth stealing." 

"That's a fair point. The only thing that you ever had that was worth taking was MJ." Harry gleamed mischievously, as he always did when the topic of Mary-Jane came up. "How's she doing these days anyway?" 

"She's good, I think. Dating again." Peter sighed. He had moved on, for the most part, but there was still part of him that missed her. "So you've probably wasted your chance."

Harry whistled. "Man, she was so out of your league." 

Okay, that was true. Completely and utterly, undeniably true. Peter still didn't understand why everyone seemed to feel the need to say it out loud though. "Gee, thanks." 

Harry wandered over to one of the leather-bound sofas and gracefully rested on top of it. Peter followed suite, but when he slumped into the couch, opposite to Harry, he had all the grace of a flailing tortoise stuck on its back. "Don't take it so personally, Pete. I'm sure you've found some model-esque science nerd to follow around at college." 

Peter sighed. "She's an English nerd, actually." 

Harry furrowed his brow in sudden bewilderment. It was nice to know that even someone as perfect as Harry Osbourne could look as dumbfounded as everyone else. "But you hated English."

"Just because I hate the subject, doesn't mean I can't be interested in a girl that likes it. I'm not that shallow." Peter shifted in the seat in an attempt to get more comfortable. The material rubbed against his trousers and it made a sound that...well, there's no getting around this. It sounded like a fart. It wasn't though. Not this time at least. "It was the chair." 

"Sure it was." Harry snickered. "So, have you asked this girl out yet?" 

Peter's gaze fell to his hands. He could still feel her touch from earlier that day. Harry made it all sound so easy, but there was a reason that his relationship with MJ hadn't worked. There was a reason that it would never work. As long as he was Spider-Man, everyone he cared about would be in danger. He didn't want to add Annabelle to that list. "I'm just...trying to focus on college at the moment. I'm working for Dr. Connors every now and then as well, just a lab assistant type deal. I don't really have time for that stuff." 

There was a sudden shift in the atmosphere. Harry's expression had darkened and twisted into something all too familiar. Peter gulped. He knew what was going to happen next, he just wished that they could get through one visit without it coming up. "So you're not following that costumed whack-job around anymore?"

"Not exclusively, no." Peter's head pounded with the beginnings of a massive migraine. Somehow, every conversation they had nowadays ended up right here; on the subject of Spider-Man. 

"But you're still doing it?" 

"Only when I need the money." Peter pushed himself out of the chair, trying not to meet his friend's eyes as he swung his backpack over his shoulder. He hadn't been there very long, but he couldn't stay if this was what they were going to be discussing. 

"How can you take photos of that sack of shit?!" Harry's voice reached new volumes, and it echoed throughout the large penthouse just to torture Peter even more. "He killed my dad!"

"You don't know that for sure, Harry." 

"Yes I do. I saw him. I know he did it." He snapped back with a low growl. "Why don't you believe me?!"

Harry's distress hurt, and a deeply buried memory of Norman Osborn's lifeless body invaded his mind. It was a day he wished that he could forget. It had changed him, completely and forever, but he hadn't killed Norman. He could never have done something so cruel on purpose... "I gotta go, Harry. I'll see you later." 

Peter shivered at the recollection of his fight with Norman, then known as Green Goblin, and moved towards the exit; desperate to escape his own mind. He had barely made it to the door when Harry yelled out "I'm...sorry, Pete. You've always been there for me, and I know that it's not your fault. I shouldn't be taking it out on you."

Peter glanced over his shoulder and smiled. "I know. It's alright."

The college student then reached for the door handle and pulled it open. Again, as he adjusted his bag on his back and stepped out of the penthouse, Harry spoke. "Do me a favour, yeah? Ask that girl out."

Peter Parker did not ask her out. He did what he always did; run around New York wearing a stupid costume and punching people for jaywalking. Okay well not jaywalking. Maybe crossing the street without looking though. By the time he was done with defusing a dangerous car chase among other really fun things, it was dark out.

When the webhead returned to his secret lair, the one-room apartment in the really bad side of town with rent that costs way more than it should, he dropped into his bed and stared at the wall for a good twenty minutes. "People really need to stop crossing the street without looking both ways." He muttered to himself, recalling the thirty times he had to swing someone to safety that day for being stupid and not watching for cars, then berate them for being irresponsible. You guys know how Peter gets about responsibility, he's like Elon Musk when you mention Mars. The moral of this paragraph is to look both ways before you cross. If you don't do it, he'll come for you. Like it says in that catchy theme song: 'look out, here comes the Spider-Man'. He's coming. He's coming for you and your jaywalking habits. 

Right now, though, the only thing Spider-Man was coming for was his shitty fridge that encrusted everything in the freezer in a layer of ice thicker than Flash Thompson's skull. Crime-fighting all day makes a man hungry, and thankfully he now had a fridge full of fruit that he had packed up earlier that evening.

Peter's eyes were half shut as he yanked the fridge door open. He smacked his lips wearily as he reached for a handful of perfectly green grapes (because, if it weren't already obvious, Harry didn't eat anything that wasn't perfect), and shoved them into his mouth all at once.

"Oh god. Oh my god that's so good. Oh I love you, ground fruit. I'm sorry you had to die." Peter mumbled to himself.

With that he carelessly slammed the fridge door closed. Suddenly, Peter remembered that he had forgotten to put his garbage out. "Ugh..................." He moaned, shutting his eyes. 

Several minutes later, Peter was standing in front of his apartment wearing Fantastic 4 pyjamas and staring at a motorcycle that took up the only space on the entire block that wasn't already taken by other bins or fire hydrants. There have been times where he didn't have his bin right on the edge of the curb. Those times, he returned home to find a full garbage can waiting for him. It was so satisfying.

Right now, this motorbike was just sitting there mocking him. 'Ha ha, despite all your power Spider-Man, you cannot defeat me! Your quest to dispose of that waste matter shall go unfulfilled, for I have finally done what the Sinister Six could not! Without any means to dispose of that garbage, you will be forced to wallow in your own sadness until you die! I have destroyed you, Spider-Man! Muhahahaha!' It cackled. Peter stood there staring at it blankly, trash can sitting next to him, as confused pedestrians started crossing the street to avoid the weirdo wearing pants with Mr Fantastic's face plastered all over them.

Reluctantly, Peter took a couple steps up to the bike and glanced around. The crowds were thinning...so he thought that perhaps, it was time to let loose his true strength. He leant down to pick up the motorbike but was stopped when he heard someone yell "Hey! Kid!"

He rolled his eyes, stood back up and saw that a fairly large biker guy was stomping over to him. "What the hell are you doin', boy? Tryin' to rip off my bike? Goddamn college students." 

Peter curled his lips in suppressed frustration as the biker shoved into his shoulder on his way over to the vehicle. The man vaulted onto the bike, spat at Peter's feet, then roared off on the obnoxiously loud thing like he was trying to get as close to every single object in sight without actually hitting them. It was actually quite impressive. 

With a deep sigh, Peter lifted his trash can and placed it right where it belonged. In his usual spot. With a weak smile, Peter planted his hands onto his hips and took a step back. Slowly, but too fast for Peter to react, so it seems, the can toppled over onto the street. The black garbage bag fell slightly out of the metal container. Then, a car whizzed by.

Peter's weekly garbage, including disposed meat, eggs, and other really smelly things, was sprayed all over the street as the car's tyre shredded open the bag. Peter's right eye twitched intensely.

There also, as if the universe had not yet fulfilled what was required of it, came a shrill cry from across the street. "The Fantastic Four sucks balls!!"

The college student glanced at the floor and exhaled heavily.


	8. Chapter Eight: A Very Stilted Conversation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Spider-Man faces another worthy adversary after being interrupted, once more, in the middle of a conversation with his crush. Who will win? The invincible Stilt-Man...or the clumsy spider?

Peter's college day ended just like any other; with him sitting in the men's bathroom and staring at the graffiti that coated the stall. It was pretty decent reading material in Peter's very experienced opinion. There were a few swear words sprawled in capitals across the door, initials etched into the corner, and little snippets of song lyrics scribbled onto the sides by people equally as bored as Peter was at that very moment. Granted, Peter didn't recognise any of these lyrics, but they provided him with a momentary distraction from Harry's constant text messages. 

Yes. He was ghosting Harry Osbourne, his best friend since 3rd grade and now the owner of one of the most influential companies of the last few decades. That might sound like a really terrible idea, and it absolutely was, but Peter had his reasons...namely that Harry kept bothering him about asking Annabelle out. He had even threatened to do it himself if Peter continued refusing. Honestly, he regretted ever mentioning her to his overzealous friend. 

Perhaps if he asked her out, purely as classmates, then Harry would be forced to stop for at least a week or two... Yeah. That didn't sound so bad. Nothing had to happen. No obligatory endangerment necessary. All he had to do was fabricate a plan - one that included an outing that wasn't too obvious and that couldn't be misconstrued for a date. Because it definitely wasn't a date. Nope. Not at all...not even a little bit. 

The first place that came to mind was the New York Hall Of Science, and the second was Rose Center For Earth And Space. These were two of his ideal hang-out spots...and by 'hang-out' he meant going alone because no one wanted to go to a science museum on the weekend. Johnny actually laughed at him once for even suggesting it. I mean, that's a little uncalled for, right? Anyway, he quickly discarded this idea because it was still too much like a 'date' and not 'a friendly outing between classmates that was totally not a date in any way, shape, or form'. 

As if by the miracle of some kind of toilet wizard, Peter let his eyes linger away from the graffiti and towards an advertisement taped to the back of the door. Peter never understood why people found it appropriate to stick messages in the bathrooms...but it was probably one of the most brilliant ideas of the century - with nothing else to do except sit there and wait for their body to do its thing, almost everyone was going to read it out of sheer boredom. 

Intelligent marketing ploys aside, Peter skimmed the page and discovered that it was an announcement about their college football team, The Red Rangers, playing against the Railsplitter's that Friday night. Now, this typically wouldn't have grabbed Peter's attention. He hated football. He hated sport. He hated team activities of any kind in college. He especially hated to sit down and watch these things, pretending to be interested when he'd much rather be at home power napping. There was something on the page, though, in big and unmissable letters - like a beacon of light during a worldwide blackout, or a roll-up in your lunchbox as a kid. It read; 'FREE FOOD'. 

Peter's heart fluttered in his chest. Truly, there was nothing more glorious than the promise of an unpaid meal...and he certainly couldn't afford to take her anywhere else. Peter's heart stopped fluttering. God, he was such a loser. No. He was a broke, disorganised loser that was going to take a girl to a football game (that he wasn't even interested in) just so he didn't have to find money to buy her food. Peter's good mood immediately soured. He certainly hadn't needed his own mind to ruin that small moment of joy...but it always did. It was like having his own personal bully, but instead of tripping him in the hallways, it gave his brain a swirly. 

The plan was to walk up to her after tomorrow's class, but not in typical Peter Parker fashion. He was gonna look cool. Maybe put on some sunglasses inside like a real tool and spike his hair up at the front. He was even going to wear his most 'hip' and 'happening' clothes (which was primarily a pair of jeans with one hole in the front and a shirt with the word 'rad' on it, but he had to work with what he got at the thrift store). These plans were immediately tossed into oncoming traffic, however, when he spotted Annabelle outside of the campus. 

She was standing near the opposing college, the one that Flash Thompson attended, and staring up at a mural. It was a giant work of art, using primarily spray paint, that showed a man sitting on a park bench and rain beginning to pour above him. It hadn't reached this unsuspecting man yet, but it would soon. That's how it would be forever. The coming storm almost reaching him, forever looming above his head, but never completely drenching him. Annabelle had taken out a permanent marker from her Thomas the Tank Engine bag (no, he's not joking), and started adding to the artwork. 

This must have peaked Peter's curiosity more than his anxiety because he soon found himself wandering over to her. 

As he grew closer, he found that she was drawing a jellyfish above the man's head. At least...he thought it was an jellyfish. Honestly, it could have been anything. The marker didn't really show up too well between the wall and the bright coloured paint. She also wasn't about to win any art competitions. 

"What's that? Some kind of Hydrozoa?" Peter quipped with the most awkward laugh to ever grace the universe. It didn't really occur to him that most people would have no idea what he was saying until she turned around with a raised eyebrow. 

"It's not a jellyfish. It's an umbrella." She replied as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

Oh my god. She knew what a Hydrozoa was. At that very moment Careless Whisper by George Michael started playing in Peter's head. You know, the one with the saxophone... "O-Oh, yeah. I suppose it is. I can totally see it now." 

He totally could not see it. The damned thing still looked like a jellyfish. Silence crept around them just like every other conversation Peter had ever engaged in. It always got uncomfortably quiet after a while because, well, he was too awkward to hold a natural interaction. 

Then, as if to save Peter from embarrassing himself with a random fact about Pluto's diameter being smaller than the continent of Australia, Annabelle spoke "You know that Octopi can lock themselves in a coconut shell. I've seen it. It's pretty gross... I love it though." 

Peter blinked at her in utter confusion. 

"Oh, sorry, I blurt things out when it gets quiet. I don't like silence." She murmured, fiddling the permanent marker between her fingers. "I mean, silence is fine sometimes...but not always, you know what I mean?"

Wow. It was like she was speaking directly to his soul. "Yeah. I know exactly what you mean." 

Annabelle smiled, it was lopsided and forced her nose to crinkle. "Do you like octopi?"

"I mean...they're animals, I suppose." Peter answered, altogether uncertain about how he was meant to respond. He never had any particularly strong opinions on cephalopods... "You like them though?" 

Annabelle nodded in confirmation but Peter was no longer surprised by her strange interests. He decided to store this potentially important information into his memory banks, and extracted the courage to ask her to the upcoming football game. Then he realised that he never had the courage to begin with.

"H-Hey, uh, you know I'm kinda struggling with the new assignment for our literature class." Peter mumbled, averting his gaze to his shoes. Both of which were practically falling apart. "I was...you know...wondering if you could help me with it." 

Annabelle adjusted the bag onto her shoulder. It was bright blue and clashed horribly with her orange sweater. "Sure. I can help." 

A grin suddenly assaulted Peter's face. Emphasis on the word assaulted, because whenever he smiled there was this strange cringe that went along with it. As if he were waiting for someone to smack it right back off. He rarely got to feel actual unbridled happiness for longer than a few minutes before something ruined it. "Really? Well, how about Friday night? There's a football game and-"

"Wait, I thought we were studying..." Annabelle questioned with a furrowed brow. "I'm not much into football...or any sport that involves sweaty guys in jockstraps." 

"Oh, that's not...I mean, I'm not much of a sports person either." Peter hurriedly admitted, finding slight relief in the fact that she wasn't interested in ogling a group of muscular athletes. "But there's free food, so I thought that we could grab something to eat and smuggle it to the library or something?" 

"Free food?" Annabelle's eyes widened, then sparkled joyfully at the thought. "I'm so in." 

Peter held his breath; waiting for the storm to appear and trample this perfect moment - maybe it would be Flash Thompson showing up with a precise whack to the jaw, or a dumpster flying through the air to drop fresh garbage on top of him, even worse, it could be Annabelle yelling 'sike!' at the top of her lungs and dashing away with bellowing laughter. 

He waited...and waited...and waited. Still, nothing came to ruin his moment. 

Peter cleared his throat with newfound triumph over the world. "Cool. I'll...meet you here then. Let's say 6 o'clock." 

Annabelle nodded and Peter gleamed with pride. He had done it. He had asked her out on...totally not a date. Even as he strode across the road with an unusual skip in his step, he still couldn't believe it. There was nothing in the universe that could drag him down from this high. Not even tripping over his own two feet as he pranced towards Dr. Conners' lab. Not even being almost run over by several vehicles running a red light. Not even the loud, maniacal laughter of a familiar foe. 

"Run!" Someone yelled, breathlessly. "It's that man with the stilts!"

"Not just any man, you gibbering idiot!" A booming, rather nasally voice echoed through the air. From the distance appeared something so tall that it dwarfed any mildly large adult male... That may not sound very tall, and maybe it wasn't, but this guy had metal contraptions fastened around his legs. That's pretty threatening. Especially if he kicked someone. I mean, that would really hurt...probably. "Make way for the new and improved STILT-MAN!"


	9. Chapter Nine: The Man In The High...Shoes?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The battle between Stilt-Man and Spider-Man reaches new heights!

Stilt-Man... Yeah, this guy's real too. Just like Plant Man and The Kangaroo. Hit up Google if you don't believe it. This shit's real, fool. Well he's technically one of Daredevil's villains, but don't let that distract you from the awesome power of his slightly elevated height. Stilt-Man means business.

"Could you kindly put your wallets and valuables on top of the nearest car for me before you run away? It's a little difficult to bend over in these things." Stilt-Man decreed.

Usually, Peter would vault into action immediately to save people from danger...but come on. It's Stilt-Man. What was he going to do? Fill people with the anxiety that his precarious wobbling might soon culminate in him tripping over and crushing someone? Spider-Man emerged from an alleyway, not swinging or anything. Just walking. That's how sick of this he was. 

"Hey! Can we...hurry this up? I got somewhere to be!" Peter called, cupping his hands around his mouth in an effort to allow the sound waves of his meek voice to reach Stilt-Man's superior elevation.

The villain stopped in his tracks and peered over his shoulder. "Oh. It's you. Where's Daredevil? I was expecting Daredevil." He said, sounding incredibly disappointed.

Peter webbed the sack of personal belongings that Stilt-Man had within his grasp and quipped "Probably sitting in his apartment with a bowl of popcorn, listening to me deal with this rubbish."

"What?! I can't hear you, I'm a little high up!"

"I...I-I said he's probably sitting in his apartment with a bowl of popcorn...listening to you annoy me!" The webhead called with an additional teaspoon of volume added to satisfy the towering troublemaker. 

You like that one? 'Towering troublemaker'? Just came up with it on the spot. Well, I guess all writing is something you come up with on the spot... Why is the narrator suddenly rambling like this, you say? Maybe because Stilt-Man became very upset with Spidey's last remark and decided to kick him with one of his spindly legs, and presenting that action in a cool, impressive way is hard. Obviously, the wall-crawler jumped clear of the attack but there are only so many ways you can say 'Spider-Man evaded the kick' before you need to recycle things, and let's not do that. It's only chapter 8, some of the good adjectives and verbs need to be saved for later on.

Just as the absolute stupidity of this situation started to dawn upon our masked hero, a blur of black and white suddenly jumped onto the scene yelling "Never fear, Protonslaught is here!"

Silence echoed through the air, and then with a loud scoff Stilt-Man said "Really? That's what you went with? How original." 

"Oi! Shut up." The leather-bound woman huffed. "I'm not the one wearing high heels." 

The towering villain gasped, utterly insulted, then muttered "They're not high heels...they're stilts." 

"Yeah, have you ever seen stilettos? They're like tiny stilts." Protonslaught argued with a confident flick of her platinum blonde hair. "So you're wearing high heels."

Spider-Man groaned. He did not want to deal with two idiots at once. Especially not now that he was almost twenty minutes late for work. "Sounds like you guys are having a really interesting conversation, you can handle him from here right?" 

Protonslaught seemed to stand a little taller at the request for help, and for the first time...well ever, he saw her smile. It was lopsided and her nose crinkled in response to it. "No need to worry, Jizz-hands. I got this." 

Now, usually Spidey would have made some gesture of disapproval, whether it be an elaborate eye-roll beneath his mask or a terrible comeback, but this time he was so incredibly anxious to get to Dr. Connors' lab that her stupid nicknames didn't bother him. 

Protonslaught took a deep, very obnoxious breath and held her hands out in front of her. Spider-Man was half expecting a banana to fly out of her sleeve but instead an icy chill flittered through the street. The ground beneath his feet froze, cracking and hissing, until it was solid ice. In fact, the entire road was completely frozen over. 

Spider-Man stared, pointing at the ground as if it were as inconceivable as a gaseous alien lifeform. "W-What do you even do?"

The girl, who had meant to make the ground slippery but certainly not turn it to ice, gave a sheepish laugh. "If you knew, it wouldn't be any fun."

The webhead huffed. There was no fun in this at all. He wasn't too affected by the ice personally because, well, he was sticky...he could climb up walls and stand upside down and do basically anything else that involved adhesion. However, the citizens in the area weren't so fortunate. There was screaming, yelling, and a lot of tire screeching as people and vehicles alike slid around on the ice. 

Spidey facepalmed. He should have seen this coming...

Amongst the crowd of voices, grunting as they all tried not to fall on their asses, Spider-Man heard a baby crying. He looked to his left and spotted a mother holding her child, slipping around and trying desperately to find something to hang on to. 

Spider-Man hurried towards the distressed mother and steadied her before she could plummet to the ground. He glanced at the sniffling baby as if it were a ravenous monster and murmured "Why isn't that thing in a pram?" 

The woman gestured behind him and towards the very object of discussion. It was skidding away on the ice at such a speed that anyone that tried to grab it would have been dragged along with the damn thing. "Hm, I dunno, buddy. Maybe because it's over there?" She snapped.

"Oh, right, sorry..." Peter rubbed the back of his masked head nervously. "I-I'll just go get that for you."

Spidey sighed deeply as he once again regretted everything. The pram slid away gently as the webslinger leapt forward like a flea. However, as if it would ever be that easy for him, Peter's brain burned within his skull. His Spidey-Sense was tingling. Yeah, 'tingle' makes it sound like it would feel good but it doesn't. It's kinda like when you get all shivery and you writhe like a weirdo for no reason at all, only difference was that you knew for a fact that something bad was going to happen afterwards.

As time seemed to freeze for Peter, he saw two cars in his peripheral vision; both drifting out of control. One was about to bust in from his left, and the other from the right. If he didn't move quick, he was going to be made into a spider sandwich. The two drivers would also plough straight into each other and die or something. Imagine that for a second. A spider sandwich. Gross right? Yeah it's pretty disgusting. Now you're going to check the next sandwich you have for spiders.

Peter pressed his right foot onto the front fender of one car and pushed it with a teeny tiny fraction of his strength whilst simultaneously webbing the back wheel of the vehicle; the engine only spun the rear axel, so this would hopefully stop the thing from going any faster. The sedan slid slowly into the base of a traffic light, causing very light damage to the front of the car but nothing serious. He then turned his attention to the other one, which was on a intercept course for his face. 

"Okay...okay...I'm gonna Superman it. I can do it. Yeah. I-I can do it." Peter muttered, slapping himself in the face and flexing his shoulders. The car got bigger, and bigger, and bigger. 

Travelling at great speed, the car slammed into Spidey, who roared in exertion as he tensed his arms to fight against the object's momentum. After several seconds of gritting his teeth, the car floated to a halt, and the webhead didn't let another second go to waste. He bounded once more, and landed right in front of the pram. "God...let's not do that again." 

In the background, as he retrieved said pram, he could hear the girlish squeal of Stilt-Man as he wobbled to and fro. 

Protonslaught laughed in triumph. "Give it up, Stiletto-Man. You gotta fall eventually." 

It was at this very moment that Spider-Man recalled how terribly every single situation ended whenever she showed up. It had been a clear mistake to ask her for help...one that he wouldn't ever repeat. 

Like the outstanding citizen that he was, the webslinger returned the pram and prevented a few more collisions; all the while Stilt-Man was still struggling to keep his balance. Seriously, it was getting ridiculous...he just refused to fall. 

Then, finally, there was an almighty 'crack' and 'crash' as Stilt-Man was sent tumbling to the ground. When Spider-Man turned his gaze towards the scene he found that he had not only fallen, but the metal stilts he wore had completely snapped off. How was this possible, you may ask? Well, Peter could only assume that Protonslaught's attempt to create an icy veil over the road also froze his stilts. It created something called a 'cold snap'. Below a certain temperature, all steel switches from being deformable to being brittle, as increasing cold weakens the connections between crystal grains. Though...something told him that she didn't know any of this, and that it had just been pure coincidence. 

As Spidey looked closer he discovered that it wasn't just the metal contraption that had broken, but the villains legs were also forced in unnatural directions. "My legs!" He whined as if he wasn't just about to rob dozens of people. "She broke my legs!" 

Protonslaught huffed. "I'll break a whole lot more if you don't shut up." 

Again, Spidey would be a little annoyed by her blatant disregard for human suffering...but he was so incredibly late for work. More than anything, he was just confused. Since he'd known Protonslaught, she had thrown a tire, created a banana peel, and turned the ground to ice - all seemingly out of thin air. Did that make her a magician or something? He honestly had no clue. 

Then it hit him like a volleyball to the head...which Peter had quite a lot of experience with. "You don't have any idea how to control your abilities, do you?"

Protonslaught's entire body tensed. "O-Of course I do! You think I turned the road to ice by accident?!" 

"Yes." Spider-Man answered simply and the girl gulped. 

"That's ridiculous. I totally meant to do this. Actually, everything I do is on purpose, always." 

"So, you broke Stilt-Man's legs on purpose?" Spider-Man murmured sceptically. 

"Y-Yeah! Well, he can't get away if his legs don't work..." 

It was sound logic, but said in a tone so anxious that it became clear that he was right. She didn't even know what her own powers were, and for some strange reason she had decided to use them anyway.

"You're evil, lady!" The stiltless Stilt-Man whined in pain. All things considered, he was taking it pretty well. The villain shifted his arms beneath him, and instinctively Spider-Man aimed a web directly at his torso. It pinned him to the ground, and Stilt-Man stared at him in absolute disbelief. "Wh-What the hell?! My legs are broken, remember? I can't escape!"

Spidey shrugged. "Can never be too careful." 

The villain looked like he might argue, but then a scent caught his attention. It was strong...so strong, in fact, that it triggered his gag reflex. He retched, but then like the curious human being that he was, he started sniffing the air again to find the source of such a smell. Stilt-Man narrowed his eyes at the webbing that trapped him on the ground then leaned forward to sniff it. "O-Oh my god, is that bleach?!"

"Yeah, it's the secret ingredient." Spider-Man quipped. "Don't eat it."

Like an excited bunny at the prospect of a freshly grown carrot, Protonslaught jumped to Spider-Man's side and grasped his right hand in hers. "How do these things work?" 

Spider-Man frowned beneath his mask, watching as she flicked the web shooter then prying his hand away. "I doubt you'd understand even if I told you-"

It was at this moment that Protonslaught's gaze met his, and her eyes beneath that domino mask caught him off guard. They were...familiar, somehow. Almost maddeningly so. 

There were already plenty of poems and stories comparing blue eyes to the electric sky or the unyielding ocean, but Peter wasn't much for poetry. They were, instead, the blue of his childhood Star Trek blanket; or, alternatively, they were bluer than Neptune. Not that the planet was naturally blue to begin with. It was actually the methane in Neptune's upper atmosphere that absorbed the red light from the sun and reflected the blue light back into space. That's what made it look blue. He was fairly certain that wasn't the case for her eyes, but still, they were pretty damn blue. 

"What the hell are you looking at, Arachnid-Boy?" Protonslaught huffed and all of Spider-Man's most bewildering thoughts were eradicated. Her eyes reminded him of someone, but she acted more obnoxious than anyone he had ever met. Maybe with the exception of Flash Thompson. 

"Wish I knew." Spidey retorted, hitting the device in his hand and swinging onto a nearby street lamp. "You can clean this up, right? I'm kinda late for something." 

"Hey! Don't dump this on me! Maybe I'm late for something too!" 

Without even acknowledging her last statement, Spider-Man flung another web, at a building this time, and swung out of sight. He left her to deal with the pain-riddled criminal howling in the background. After all, she was the one that barged in and broke his legs...and at this stage Peter was even more late for work than usual. Dr Connors really wasn't going to like this.


	10. Chapter Ten: Science, Bitches

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Now, true believers, we follow our webbed hero to his workplace - a lab run by the one and only Curtis Connors.

Peter Parker was one of those dudes that everybody thought was a little weird. Not because anyone thought he was a superhero or anything, pft, of course not. Because he was always stepping out of janitor's closets, storerooms, bathrooms, and stairway doors looking extremely sweaty and out of breath. The campus security personnel would exchange their guesses whenever he came fumbling along.

One guard, leaning on the side of Columbia University's campus security office, crossed his arms. "I reckon he was having a wank."

His pal cocked his head in confusion and replied "What? Look at him. He hasn't had any desire for anything in his life. He was eating a sandwich."

"A sandwich? Why a sandwich?"

"What else would a kid like that eat? A burrito?"

The pair stared as Peter sprinted from the main building to the sciences department. The shoelace of one shoe was undone and whipped about wildly as he flailed awkwardly on his run. 

"Yeah...you're right. It's probably ham."

"Ham and cheese. Plain white bread. Not toasted."

Peter's shoelace got caught in the steel grill of a bin and tugged his foot back. Of course, to the untrained eye, one would expect the unassuming man to fall over. But on the contrary, all that befell Peter Parker was a really weird forced leg spread since his left foot was stuck and couldn't step when it needed to. He sighed and hopped over to the bin and snatched his shoelace free.

"Totally"

We now leave the two unnamed security officers that will never be mentioned again since they were just a neat way to begin this chapter, and instead travel alongside Peter Parker into Columbia University's sciences building. And here now, true believers, witness another instance of the famous 'Parker Luck®'; our wallcrawler applied for several colleges during his final months at high school. One of them was Empire State University, and another was Columbia. His classroom science teacher, Mister Warren, had recommended him as a lab assistant to an old colleague named Curtis Connors who conducted research and lectured at Columbia. Peter scored the job after a short internship and worked there for the remainder of his high school days. When he graduated, of course Peter was accepted into ESU and not Columbia. He worked on one side of New York, and studied at the other. Even with his super extreme spider powers, it was almost impossible to make it on time normally, let alone when a psycho wearing stilts showed up and tripped over himself. 

Meanwhile, whilst you were reading that overly complicated exposition that perhaps wasn't entirely necessary but funny nonetheless because Peter having mildly inconveniencing stuff happening to him is funny and/or relatable, he came barging through the door to the genetics lab.

The first thing he saw was Dr. Connors, completing the preparations for the long-planned trial he and Peter were scheduled to perform today. "Doctor Connors...I'm so sorry. Something came up..." Peter sighed as he took his bag off, tossed it into the back room and snapped up his coat from the rack.

"Parker, I have a question for you. Are you serious about your work, or are you not? If I don't like your answer, I'll ask you to pack your things and get out of my lab." Connors said calmly. 

"Sir...I..I'm sorry. I'm trying to...be here on time."

"Don't try, Parker. Just do it. My wife's convincing is the only reason I haven't fired you on the spot."

Peter's eyes fell to the ground.

"Get over here and do your job before I change my mind, please."

"Y-Yes sir!" Peter stammered, hurrying over to his employer who was tending to their samples.

Doctor Connors was spearheading bioengineering research, his prime goal being to use the CRISPR system to isolate and map the elusive 'early growth response' control gene and use it to repair physical injury. Other doctors and professors in the faculty were pursuing other avenues of genetic research, some focusing on fish DNA to achieve regeneration. However, Connors possessed experience in the field of reptilian biology and thus sought out to identify and source their regenerative code, and to use CRISPR to insert this gene into humans, effectively gifting anyone given the treatment with a regenerative healing factor. This may or may not be motivated by the fact that he lost an arm when he was a combat surgeon in the US Army or something, but he insists that it also allows human beings to recover from what could be fatal injuries.

If all of that just sifted through your brain because you were expecting some kind of magic needle injection instead of a long-winded attempt to keep at least one foot planted in real-life science, Peter would be disappointed in you. However, because stupidness is absolutely not your fault and is fine, this is the short version: Doctor Connors wants to copy paste lizard stuff into people so we can not die when certain shit happens to us, maybe even grow arms and legs back. Cool, right?

Right now, they were still working their way through biological samples of hundreds of different reptile species and isolating what was thought to be the EGS gene in each. As Peter readied the petri dish that held salamander DNA, he said quietly "Doctor Connors...thank you. I-I need this job...and I love it. It's my dream to be working in a lab like this, doing this kind of research. I won't let you down again."

Connors thinned his lips as he moved over to a tray lined with capsules of the Cas9 protein that would be introduced into their reptile DNA samples with the preprogrammed task of removing a certain code sequence. Seconds of silence filled Peter's heart with dread until Connors finally spoke. "...Look, Peter. You've been of incredible help on the project. Quite frankly, I would expect this level of involvement from a research partner, not an assistant."

Peter loved science. Everybody knew that. Everything from astrophysics, biology, chemistry, and hell, even geology made his eyes water. But, like the good Doctor Connors, Peter had a personal stake in this. When he first got this job, he wanted to understand the source of his powers, and to do that he needed to map his own genome. After doing so, he discovered that the spider bite he got slapped with only altered portions of his DNA. Whatever venom that turned him into a super spider boy was clearly perfectly balanced against the human immune system. It didn't give him extra eyes or arms, yet it also wasn't completely blanked out by his immune system. Instead, they both cancelled each other out and he became both at the same time. 

After learning this, he realised that he himself was the end product of what Connors was trying to do; a human-animal genetic hybrid. And the odds of it working out the exact same way without an extremely calculated response was...well...pretty shitty. He was determined to help Connors get his arm back, and hopefully even save more lives in the long run once tests were complete. And, of course, perhaps...maybe...even use the data to perform the same process but in reverse; remove integrated animal gene sequences from a human system. Once again, for the people that don't understand a word of this; he wanted to cure himself of Spider-Man permanently.

Connors continued "But I can't keep paying you for not being here. If there's anything going on, the university has several counsellors you can speak to. I don't want to see you waste your abilities by being late, coming to work exhausted, and well, pardon my French, not giving a shit."

Peter tensed his brow. "I do give a shit, sir."

"Of course you do. Now shut up and let's do this." 

Minutes passed in utter silence as the pair went from sample to sample, injecting the Cas9 enzyme quickly and efficiently. Connors was hoping to inspect each instance of the EGR code individually, and perhaps even integrate all samples in order to create a more reinforced and robust version of trials on mice. 

Before too long, Doctor Martha Connors entered the room with a fresh batch of reptile samples for later testing. "I told you he'd be here, Curt."

Without averting his gaze and dropping his concentration...wait, there are now two Doctor Connors in this scene. Well, this means that after calling him Doctor Connors the entire time, he will suddenly now be referred to as Curtis. Now wasn't that a smooth transition? Without averting his gaze or dropping his concentration, Curtis remarked monotonously "You also told me you'd be back in five minutes. I don't suppose you use the same brand of watch as Mister Parker here?"

"Oh grow up. How are you Peter? How's your degree going?"

"I'm okay, Mrs. C. It's alright I guess."

Curtis rolled his eyes "You need some more self-confidence, Peter. No one likes a man who isn't sure of himself. Especially women."

"Really?" Peter pressed.

Martha laid the tray of petri dishes onto a nearby counter. "No. Don't listen to him. You sounded a little inquisitive there. Is there someone you've got your eyes on?"

"Martha, now isn't the time--"

"Curt? Shut up." Martha snapped. Peter blinked rapidly as he continued cycling through the organic materials. She continued by asking "What's the deal, Peter?"

"U-Uh...I like her. I'm supposed to be going out with her on Friday night?"

"Excuse me?" Curtis droned.

Peter arched an eyebrow.

"You're working. Here."

"What? I am?"

"Yes. "

Martha groaned in frustration "Old man, you are going to let this boy go on a date with his woman."

"O-Oh it's not a date and she's n-not my woman." Peter sheepishly interjected.

"Leave is reserved for unforeseen circumstances."

"Getting a date isn't an unforeseen circumstance?" Martha questioned.

"It's inadequate."

"Inadequate?" Said Martha, crossing her arms.

Peter set his current petri dish and threw his hands up "Do I need to call nine one one and report a domestic dispute?"

"Don't be ridiculous." The geneticist stated blandly. "A university lab isn't a domestic environment." 

Martha, clearly not too pleased with her husband's behaviour, simply ignored his response and spoke directly to Peter. "Although he's never going to tell you himself, Curtis wasn't a straight arrow as you might expect. To be honest, you remind me of him. This situation in particular reminds me of how he snuck out of his base when he was in the army so he could take me to watch a movie."

Curt bit his lip and tensed his brow, continuing his Cas9 applications. 

"What? Are you serious? He went AWOL for a date?" Peter whistled.

"Yes. He was quite the romantic. So, Curt honey, do you remember that night?"

"...Yes..." He sighed. "Fine. But we're getting through all these samples today, understood?"

Peter breathed a sigh of relief. It was loud...really loud. It sounded like a gust of wind had creaked through the building and punched him in the gut. Having to cancel his 'totally not date' with Annabelle would have been disastrous. "Y-Yeah, of course! Thanks."

Now, finishing one hundred and fifty samples in one afternoon would usually be fairly easy...but, as I'm going to mention for the fortieth time, Peter was incredibly late. He had lost a few hours of daylight and had to practically press fast-forward on his brain just to finish them all in time. 

By some miracle he succeeded and left without annoying Doctor Connors any further. Don't let this brief exchange fool you, Peter had an enormous amount of respect for Curtis, and vice versa, but his tardiness was enough to test any employer. The fact that he hadn't been fired yet was enough to suggest that Connors was a decent guy. 

Embarrassment still lingering over his head like a dozen grey clouds, Peter journeyed to the roof of the university building. He stripped off his loose-fitting button-up shirt and his jeans with the massive hole in the thigh...and no, before you ask, he wasn't naked underneath. You should all know by now that he wore his Spider-Man suit underneath his clothes as if they were some special kind of underwear; a full-body...muck covered one.

Upon pulling the mask over his head Peter stuffed the clothes into his bag, pulled it over his shoulder, and swung away. The streets were fairly quiet. Well, apart from the usual traffic trouble and verbal battles. Certainly nothing that warranted a super-powered arachnid to save the day. 

He did, however, spot Annabelle skipping down the sidewalk with a bag clutched tight in her hands that read 'Midtown Kebabs'. She was grinning like a Cheshire Cat, and...humming? Yeah. Peter was close enough to vaguely hear it. So could the people around her who blinked in bewilderment as she passed completely oblivious to their strange glances. 

It is important to note here that Peter Benjamin Parker was no stalker. He rarely had time to follow people around anyway, and even when he did it was usually some old creepy guy that he suspected of criminal activity. Even now, as he followed Annabelle at a reasonably unnoticeable distance, he was definitely not stalking her. He was just...worried about her safety. Kebabs were pretty popular nowadays. Someone might try and rob her of that five dollar meal. Spider-Man wouldn't allow it. 

Apparently a thief was no match for Annabelle's own clumsiness though. Within the span of five minutes she had tripped over her own feet and stumbled onto the road. Her kebab bag smashed against the asphalt, but that was probably only a secondary concern compared to the truck that was only seconds away from hitting her. The driver tried to stop and the breaks screeched, but it was already too late. 

Heart practically breaking his ribcage in half, Peter leapt into action. He pressed down on his webshooter with such pressure that he was surprised that he didn't immediately break it on impact, and the spindly rope-like substance stuck itself onto Annabelle's backpack. He yanked her backward, caught her before she could fall, and that truck zoomed passed only milliseconds later. 

Annabelle's eyes were wide, breath hollow, and her entire body was tense with shock. A pretty standard reaction to, not only tripping into traffic, but being pulled back and barely missing an early grave. She could even see her own tombstone standing, lonely, on the other side of the road. She swore that she could. It was dark grey and read 'Here lies Annabelle Lee. Beloved student, I guess. She made literally no contribution to anyone's life. RIP'.

"U-Uh...are you alright?" Spider-Man stuttered, trying to ignore the fact that she smelt like toast today. He was so close that he could almost tell what kind of toast it was. The mask was in the way of that though. Suddenly, he regretted designing his costume to have one that covered his nose. 

Annabelle gulped then turned her gaze towards him. She was wearing bright green eyeshadow like something out of the 80s. He swore she hadn't been wearing it earlier that day. "You're...The Human Spider..." 

Have you ever been punched in the jaw by a bodybuilder? Well, this was much worse. Not only had she got his name horribly wrong, but she looked so confident about it as well. How was he meant to correct her when she sounded so certain? Seriously...she knew who The Human Torch was, just one member of the Fantastic Four, but she had no idea what his actual name was? That was a painful reality check that Peter hadn't needed today. 

"Yeah...Human Spider, close enough." He shrugged, but he couldn't dismiss his dwindling self-esteem so easily. He couldn't even look at her after such a rejection. Instead, his eyes had flicked to the road where her kebab wrap had dropped...only there was no kebab inside at all. Instead, splattered all across the ground and being run over by a myriad of cars, was a bag full of cooked pasta. No sauce. No meat. Just pasta. "Is there any particular reason you were carrying fettuccine around?" 

"Oh, it was just a snack." Belle answered as if she wasn't absolutely insane. She rustled into her backpack and pulled out two more kebab bags. Belle opened one of them, then took out a long piece of pasta and gobbled it down like a baby bird. She extended the remaining one towards Spider-Man as if it were potted gold. "Here. For saving me." 

The webslinger stared at it in disbelief, but accepted her offer nonetheless. After all, it was food. Better yet it was food given to him by Annabelle Lee. "What's with the kebab bag?"

"They have foil on the inside to keep stuff hot." She beamed brightly at him; like the sun. Peter was worried that even his costume wouldn't protect him from being burned. 

"Gee, thanks..." Spider-Man said, clearly perplexed about the entire situation. This was definitely the strangest way that anyone had thanked him for saving their life. He wasn't even sure how to react. 

What is a man to do when handed a bag full of cooked pasta by his crush? It was one of the world's many unanswered questions. Perhaps the most important one that Peter had ever been faced with.


	11. Chapter Eleven: Full-ish House

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Avengers Tower wasn’t typically Peter’s hangout of choice, but after Tony Stark requests a meeting with him, he has no choice but to visit the group of Avengers.

The living space in Avengers HQ was top-notch. It made Peter want to cry. There were well-kept quarters for everyone who lived in it, state-of-the-art lab facilities, and most importantly, a constantly stocked kitchen. Peter was currently stuck to the wall in the kitchen area, ravaging a packet of Twisties like he hadn't eaten since he was born.

Hey now, Peter Parker was no freeloader. Most of the time. He was here for a reason; he was contacted earlier by Tony Stark, who said he needed to discuss something with the webhead. But, as expected, when Peter showed up, the guy was busy tending to equipment damage sustained during a mission led by Captain Rogers. Some tech, including Quinjet 5, Cap's protective uniform, and Hawkeye's specialised arrowheads, needed some once overs before they were either repaired or replaced. 

Spidey heard some voices from the hallway growing louder. "I'm not saying that we need your help, I'm saying that most of the fights we go through would be over in ten seconds if you stuck around."

"There be Nine Realms that require the protection of the Thunder, friend Barton. Loathe be, I cannot spend all my moons on Midgard." 

"What?"

"He says he has better things to do than protect you." A woman retorted with immense sass.

Four figures entered the room; Captain America, Hawkeye, Wasp, and Thor. 

"Ehlo guhys." Peter greeted, mouth full of eviscerated Twisties and his gloveless fingers encrusted with the dust of his fallen cheesy enemies. The glove of his costume was sitting on the kitchen counter, and his mask had been pulled up and over his mouth to allow for the intake of sustenance.

Steve nodded curtly "Twice in one week, Peter." 

Janet smiled energetically as she called melodically "Heyyyyy!"

Thor bellowed "Greetings my friend."

Clint frowned in disgust. "Jesus, you want to slow down there cowboy? You're getting cheese dust everywhere."

As the group entered, Thor set his trusty hammer, Mjolnir, onto the table and planted his hands on his hips. "Stifle thy misgivings, my avid arching companion; a feast is the mark of a victory well won! We too have smelt the sweet stench of a defeated foe. Speak; in the glory of what triumph doth thou currently bask by way of thy vigorous gorging?"

"Arh got arh pestuh." He slurred, still piling Twisties into the hatch.

"How old are you? Chew your food." Janet pressed.

Peter swallowed and clarified "I got a pasta." 

"...'A pasta'? You got 'a pasta'?" Hawkeye repeated monotonously in disbelief and disappointment. 

"Yeah. From a girl I like. It was awesome."

"She cooked you a meal? Sounds like you're getting somewhere." Steve said as he opened the fridge and pulled out a bottle of spring water. Steve was wearing a fitted white t-shirt instead of his trademark uniform shirt; as previously mentioned, you dumb dumb, it was currently being appraised and mended by Tony.

"Oh. It was just the pasta in a paper bag. I mean it was boiled, though."

Steve cocked his head, furrowed his brow and squinted all at once. "Is...that a thing now?" He glanced around the room with genuine curiosity. He wasn't the kind of person who kept up with social trends and stuff. He had become incredibly caught up in recent years; you couldn't tell he was a hundred years old and lived most of his life without the magic of Spongebob Squarepants. But when it came to emerging trends, you could easily see the confusion in his eyes. Peter remembered trying to explain those weird Freddy Mercury meme videos to him. It was like showing a parent or a grandparent something and it just went completely over their heads; they were just confused at the end of it all. 

Clint saw an opportunity and took it. "Duh, Steve. Didn't I tell you about when I got my pasta from Bobbi? She gave me a whole damn sack of spaghetti."

Steve nodded and pursed his lips, in an effort to absorb this information. "As soon as I'm used to everything, there's always something else that changes."

"Clint." Janet scalded, despite the fact that she thought it was kinda funny. 

Hawkeye shrugged "What? Hank never gave you some ravioli or something? Ouch. That's rough."

"It's not a thing, Steve." She said reluctantly

The Captain rolled his eyes.

"Thanks Jan. You ruined it." Clint sighed as he leapt onto the couch, tracking soot and ash all over it. 

Janet winked as she slid onto one of the stools at the kitchen counter. 

Steve, after sculling the entire bottle of water as if he were some sort of demented fish man, sorry Namor, tossed the empty vessel into the bin and approached Peter with even more curiosity. "So this woman...gave you pasta...in a bag? That's very...generous of her."

"Was it Bolognese at least? Janet quizzed.

Peter licked the tips of his cheesy fingers "No sauce."

"No sauce..." Steve ruminated, puzzled.

"Yeah."

Steve scratched the back of his head. "...Salt?"

"Nah. It was just boiled pasta."

"And...this was meant to be a gift?"

"Yeah, she tripped onto the street and I saved her."

Thor rubbed his beard contemplatively "Hm, curious. I cannot say that I have ever been granted this 'pasta' as a spoil of battle. Is she of sound mental health?"

"Well? Uh, yeah. Pretty sure. Why are we talking about my personal life again?"

"Because this broad's nuts. Get out while you can. You shouldn't have let that hot redhead dump you. Your new girlfriend's batshit insane."

"She's not my girlfriend, Hawkguy."

Steve snatched an apple from the fruit bowl and took a bite out of it as Thor brushed passed him and reached into the fridge, before saying "You should let her know how you feel, Peter. Give her a bouquet, take her dancing, go see a picture together."

"Picture? What picture? Art gallery?" Peter quipped.

"Funny." Steve dismissed. 

Janet leant onto the counter and raised an eyebrow. "So uh...do you like that she gave you pasta?"

"Of course I do. I'm a college student." Spidey replied.

Thor plucked a bottle of Budweiser from the fridge and stared at it like it was some kind of completely strange sight that he had never beheld before. He literally pulled the cap off, which was a twist-off by the way, and took a swig. Afterwards, his face was painted with a sneer of pure disappointment "What manner of bile concoction is this? Doth this be some charlatan's excuse for ale? A child could ingest gallons of such weak dribble."

"Thor, it's American beer. It sucks." Clint muttered, laying down on the couch as he tossed a baseball up at the ceiling over and over again.

Steve, crossing his arms, took a step forward. "Come on, break time's over Clint. We got post-op duties to see to."

Clint groaned "Man, how come Thor doesn't have to file reports and manage equipment?"

"Because he'd Superman the computer." Peter added.

"What the hell does that mean?" Clint asked dryly.

"You know, age old trope of 'guy doesn't know how strong he is so he accidentally destroys something for comedic effect'?"

Wasp shrugged "It's not a trope if it's real, bug boy. I personally filled a drawer with extra doorknobs after you came by the first time."

Peter replied "I stand corrected."

"But thou art not standing..." Thor murmured not loud enough for anyone to hear. 

Before long, Cap berated Hawkeye enough to get him to go with him and Janet to submit some incident reports regarding the mission. To help with the legalities of everything, it was always handy to have individual reports of every operation the Avengers embarked on. Thor held aloft his magic hammer and said "By the power of Asgard, I bid thee farewell." Before smashing through yet another glass window, Budweiser bottle still in hand. 

At that point, once the party was over, Tony Stark finally appeared, shirt, face, and arms covered in grease. "Thanks for coming Pete."

"Woah."

"Yeah, I had to work overtime today. Everyone's breaking all of my expensive shit. You here about my call?"

"Yeah...I am. What did you need?" Peter answered, his hand now completely clean of Twisties dust thanks to the biological miracle of tongues and saliva. 

Tony answered "I...wanted to ask you to join us again. The Avengers."

"We talked about this already, man. I'm just too busy for this kind of stuff."

"Peter, if you become a full-time Avenger you get a salary. You get paid. You don't need to study, or work, or anything. I know you've been having a tough time with cash, I can solve that for you."

Peter detached himself from the wall and threw his hands up in defeat. "You still don't get it. I don't need your help, Tony. I don't want it. I'm going to make it through by working hard and doing it legit."

"This is legit."

"Maybe. But answer this for me. Why do I deserve your money while there are people out there who work even harder and get nothing from you? Why not ask someone else to join? There are plenty of heroes that would be a better fit...but you come to me because you know I need the money. I think you're probably even under the impression that I need guidance. I don't though, and there are plenty of other potential Avengers candidates that actually have the time to be involved." 

"...You're starting to sound like Reed." Tony said quietly.

Peter shook his head. "I'm fine with what you do, I really am. I just don't want to be treated any differently than the guy on the street."

"Why the hell are you so stubborn about this?"

"Because I was brought up to value working hard for something, Tony. My Uncle Ben worked seven days a week for thirty-two years of his life to buy a tiny, two-bedroom house in Queens. It's not a mansion, it's not perfect, but he put everything into it. I know you're just trying to help, but I don't want your pity. I want to earn things, not have them handed to me on a platter."

Silence filled the room as Tony sighed and looked about. Peter had been a temporary member in the past, but his life was simply too packed to warrant being permanently involved in one more thing. 

'What?', you say? 'Spider-Man is meant to be Iron Man's sidekick', you say? Well, Peter was never one to be anyone's sidekick. He was Spider-Man, not Spider-Boy, not Iron Lad, not even Iron boy. Peter was determined to be responsible (you should have a shot of vodka every time you read that word), and that determination couldn't be shattered by anyone.

Tony finally asked "Is that...is that a broken window on the thirty-fifth level of my skyscraper base?"

"Uh...yeah. It was Thor."

"He's like a goddamn pigeon. Can never see the bloody things."

Though it was tempting to further agitate Tony Stark, Peter decided not to smash another window on his way out. Instead, he used the front door like a normal human being...well, a normal guy with a full-body costume and holding a bag of cooked pasta. So, maybe not so normal after all. 

As he distanced himself from Avengers Tower, he felt something shake inside of his backpack. He fumbled to pry open the zip and pull out his phone - answering mere seconds before it went to voicemail. 

"Peter, are you there?" The small, sweet voice of his old aunt sounded on the other end. 

"Y-Yeah! How are you, Aunt May?" Peter answered, swinging out of public view and perching on the top of a nearby sign. He pulled his mask over his mouth, only barely, to ensure that his voice wasn't muffled. He didn't want to make her suspicious. Yeah, his seventy-six year-old aunt didn't know that he was Spider-Man. Nobody knows, because you know, it's a secret identity. Well MJ knows but that doesn't count because we all know MJ is going to get tossed into the back boot for this one. I'll give you a few seconds to process the fact that she isn't some young, hot mom that Tony Stark can flirt with for a laugh. 

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Okay, ready to continue? I'll just assume you said yes because at this very moment Aunt May is replying to Peter in her cute, old lady voice. "Oh, I'm fine. Just taking a few of Ben's things to the basement." 

Peter's entire face paled behind the mask. He hadn't looked at that stuff in years...but the idea of it being removed from his aunt's place made him feel a little empty. He had loved his Uncle Ben like a father. There was no one else like him in the entire world; he taught Peter the value of patience, hard work, and get your shots ready, responsibility. "Your moving Uncle Ben's stuff? Why?"

"I thought it was time to redecorate, and heaven knows Ben never had any taste." There was a hint of sorrow in her tone that sliced right through Peter's heart. "Don't worry, it's not like I'm getting rid of this stuff. It will all be here if you ever want to look at it." 

Peter sighed, attempting to subdue an almost unbearable memory. "You should have told me, I could've helped..."

"Nonesense, I'm not dead yet." May laughed, but Peter hated it when she even mentioned death. He had already lost his Uncle, and as the years passed he feared the inevitability of his Aunt leaving as well. "I only called because a few volunteers at the homeless shelter called in sick for tomorrow's free lunch. I was hoping you could come in and give me a hand." 

"Sure. I got a free day tomorrow anyway." Peter replied without hesitation. His aunt had been keeping herself busy since Uncle Ben passed. She got involved with charities, helping people in rehab, and was an avid volunteer at the homeless shelter. Even at her age, she was still finding ways to help people. If Uncle Ben was Peter's moral compass, then his Aunt May was his hero. She had always been, even now. Spider-Man couldn't hold a candle to that woman. 

He was more than happy to help her in any way that he possibly could...and maybe he could sneak some free soup on the side. 'College student' and 'homeless' were kind of the same thing, in some ways. Except he had a roof over his head, so it wasn't 'homeless', it was just 'less'. Less food, less time, less sleep.


	12. Chapter Twelve: Aunt-Man & The Wasp

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Volunteering at a soup kitchen seems like a recipe for a boring yet fulfilling day...but for Peter, it ends with yet another conflict - and this time with a villain that isn’t completely useless.

An atrocity had been committed. It was an act so vile...so reckless, that Peter doubted that he would ever forgive himself. He had eaten that glorious bag of cooked pasta given to him by Annabelle Lee. It was a crime, honestly. Each piece of fettuccine should have been strung across the wall as a momentum...but instead he had scoffed it all down for dinner; not caring that it had grown cold during the long wait or that it was utterly sauceless. Hunger will do that to a man. One minute he's admiring the most valuable gift ever given to him, and the next he's chewing on it to see if it's edible.

Apparently, it was more than edible...but didn't last long. The next day Peter was back to being hungry again, with no food in his fridge and an aching stomach. His long trudge to the homeless shelter certainly didn't help matters either.

Peter shuffled inside the familiar building, trying his best to ignore the rumble of hunger consuming him. The room was relatively large, with chairs and tables lined up for the daily visitors. The scent of cheap soup filled the air and Peter groaned. The irony of a starving man serving starving people wasn't lost on him. 

"Peter!" The somewhat weakened voice of his aunt called from across the threshold. She wobbled towards him, smiling brightly and pulling him into a tight embrace. It had been at least a few weeks since he'd last seen her; college, work, and the Spider-Man gig kept him busier than he cared to admit. He felt incredibly guilty about not visiting her more often, but May always insisted that she was fine...whether that was a lie or not Peter couldn't tell. "It's so good to see you!" 

"You too, Aunt May." Peter replied with a twinge of regret. He needed to get back into a weekly visiting schedule, despite how little time he had. "Look, I promise I'm gonna get my act together and come see you more often."

"Oh don't be silly. As much as I would like to chain you to my coffee table, it is very clear to me that you are a young man with a job and a college career. I'm so very proud of you, Peter. I wouldn't want you to waste time worrying about little old me." She said, gripping Peter by the shoulders. Knowing full well that Peter was about to argue with her, she quickly moved on. "Anyway, that little Kevin from across the street's shown me how to use my cell phone. The wretched thing's been a paperweight for four years now, but I can finally call you whenever I like."

"Cell phone? What happened to the landline?"

"Well...it was another thing I couldn't afford to have. Not that I needed it in the first place; Mary Jane's Aunt Anna is the only person I talk to these days and she's just around the corner."

As his Aunt pulled away, Peter's gaze lowered. May had been struggling financially ever since Uncle Ben's death. It pained him to see her barely sustaining herself in this last stage of life...she deserved to be comfortable, but she was constantly in debt and never able to dig her way out of it. 

Now, at this stage you might be saying 'Hey, that's really sad. Where are the jokes?'. There are none when it comes to his Aunt May. She is a completely no joke zone. 

"What happened to you and Mary Jane anyway?" May asked with concern glimmering in her eyes. No matter how many years past, those eyes never changed; as if all of her youth had not disappeared, but simply been captured in the watercoloured irises. "Anna and I were certain that we'd be attending a wedding soon." 

"We were just going down different paths..." Peter sighed at the thought. He had adored MJ, but it was never going to work between them. The constant danger drew them apart, despite Mary-Jane's strong facade, and they were ultimately just too different. He would always care for her, of course, but they could never allow it to reach beyond the borders of friendship again. "And you don't need to pretend like Anna was upset. I know she was happy to hear that we broke up." 

Aunt May's kind gaze grew conflicted, and yet she still tried to spare Peter's feelings. "Don't be ridiculous, she was very upset about it." 

Peter's aunt rarely lied, and whenever she did it was like watching a five year-old trying to get away with eating all of the cookies or something. It was definitely cute, how adamantly she tried to defend Peter's self-esteem, but it never truly succeeded. "Don't even try it. That woman never liked me... Besides, MJ already told me how overjoyed her aunt was." 

May pursed her lips, clearly uncertain about how to respond. It was true, Anna had a deeply embedded dislike for Peter. She thought that he was irresponsible (probably due to the fact that he was never on time for anything) and unworthy of her niece...it had been a great point of conflict within her friendship with May. Still, they had somehow managed to remain close. "I wouldn't quite use the word 'overjoyed'..."

"Forget it, Aunt May. It doesn't matter anymore." Peter said with relative indifference. One of the only positive things about his break up with MJ was that he no longer had to deal with her Aunt Anna. Seriously, he could almost cry tears of joy at the thought. "When do we start serving the food?"

"In a few minutes." May smiled. "Thank you for coming. You'll be in the kitchen with me, but there's a little donation booth right next to us if you want to help out a little more. If you see someone come in with something to donate, just duck over there to take it off their hands." 

Peter nodded and followed his aunt to the kitchen...though he had really wanted to ask if college students counted as homeless, and if they did, if he could snag a bowl of soup - the science major had to practically wrestle this question away from his mouth as they prepared to serve.

The line was long. It swivelled around the room and tumbled out the door. With every person that approached him, Peter managed to maintain some semblance of dignity. He'd smile, take the bowl from their hands, pour the soup, then hand the steaming bowl of deliciousness back with a cheery 'enjoy'...but on the inside he was dying. His eyes were watering as the smell of food hit his senses, and his stomach was practically growing arms just so that it could claw its way out of his body and towards the soup. 

Okay, that may have been a bit of an exaggeration, but the main point was that Peter was hungry. Really, really hungry. In fact, he may have even snuck a bite if he didn't get distracted by a laundry pile with legs. Yes, you read that right. Coming through the door at that very moment was a towering stack of clothing, but it moved with the limbs of a human being...or maybe someone was carrying the clothes but, let's be honest, that's exponentially less interesting. 

So, with that in mind, the sentient mound of fabric wobbled towards the donation booth. Peter shuffled away from the kitchen and propped himself behind the booth with an almost eerie smile. "Here to donate?" 

From behind this monstrosity of brightly coloured material a girl appeared. Well, half of her face did at least. She had somehow managed to glance around the heavy pile to greet the man at the booth. Their eyes met, and she smiled. "Hi, Peter!"

Peter blushed like a leaf in the middle of Autumn. The last person that he had expected to see today was Annabelle Lee...and now he was a nervous wreck. Suddenly, all the composure that he had maintained during the day had disappeared. 

"I had a lot of extra clothes in my closet." Belle spoke and the world shattered around him like a snowglobe. "I thought that maybe someone else could enjoy them as much as I did." 

She was looking right at him. Those misty spheres of sapphire and kyanite had locked him in place, completely speechless. His mind was muttering curses to itself over and over and over again. He hadn't brushed his hair...why hadn't he brushed his hair today? It probably looked like a rats nest, or a bundle of dry hay, or even a messy ball of cotton. One of them...any of them...all of them. It didn't matter, he looked dishevelled regardless. 

"What are you doing here anyway, Peter?" Annabelle asked, shifting her arms beneath the stack of clothing to ensure that she didn't drop it. 

Immediately noticing this, Peter basically yanked the massive pile out of her arms. It wasn't heavy, at least to him, but it was definitely impressive that Belle had been able to carry it for so long. "I'm...uh...just helping out my aunt." 

"Really? That's nice of you." Belle hummed, and Peter had to put down the pile of clothing before his trembling hands dropped the whole lot of it. 

The clothing was exactly what you would expect from someone like Annabelle; colours so bright that they blinded you on sight, and all with weird designs that either looked too old or too young for someone in college. He supposed that most people living on the streets wouldn't much care about what the clothes actually looked like, but it was still notable all the same. There were even some leggings that were glittery, like a child's art project, and shoes that had butterfly wings moulded into the sides. 

"Th-Thanks for bringing these in." Peter forced the words out of his dry throat, but they were croaky and trembly when they finally reached the air. "I'm sure they'll help a lot of people." 

An important note to make here is that Aunt May could always tell when Peter was struggling; especially when that involved a girl. Granted, it was much worse when he was younger. He'd even thrown up once after trying to talk to his first girlfriend, Gwen Stacy. This time, however, he was simply shifting around on the spot nervously, and May couldn't help but saunter towards the scene. 

"Who's your friend, Peter?" She asked, and as far as Peter was concerned she was his hero. If she hadn't shown up he definitely would have found a way to embarrass himself...not that he hadn't done that already. May glanced at Belle's floral, completely ancient shirt and grinned. Clearly, she had the same fashion sense...maybe Johnny was right when he said Belle dressed like an old woman...

"This is...well, she's...um..." Peter muttered. Annabelle was staring directly at him and that was completely ruining his concentration. 

"I'm Annabelle." The girl answered, evidently noticing Peter's incompetence. "We're in the same literature class." 

May's expression morphed into one of surprise. "Literature? Peter always hated English in high school." 

"It was the only unit that fit in with my timetable..." Peter sighed. He truly regretted taking Education Studies as a minor. It was the reason he was stuck in a class about confusing plays and corny poetry. Though he supposed it wasn't all bad, after all, it was the reason that he had met Annabelle. 

"You really don't like English? I thought you said you were enjoying the unit material..." 

Peter's complexion turned ashen. Let this be a lesson, kids, never lie to your crush. You just end up looking like a major douchebag when they finally figure it out. 

This awkward moment seemed to stretch into infinity. Peter's mind was running through possible excuses, but that was cut short when a loud crashing sound screeched through the room. A window had been smashed into pieces by a bright ball of light. It shivered through the air...and trashed everything within its path. Screams of fright and bewilderment echoed from the panicking civilians as they hid beneath tables and behind furniture. 

Peter huffed in irritation. He knew exactly what this was...and he was once again bitter about the fact that he couldn't get through one day without something ruining it. The light brightened, blindingly so, and anyone that was caught staring at it was consumed by darkness. 

"I...I can't see!" May yelled in horror, hands reaching out to search for her nephew. "Peter, where are you?" 

As Annabelle turned at the sound, she found that Peter was gone. Like, he had literally just vanished into thin air...or he had run away. Belle scoffed in disbelief. Peter Parker had ditched his own aunt in fear, and that knowledge filled her with dislike. Up until this moment she had been relatively fond of Peter; he seemed like a decent enough guy, and she didn't mind the prospect of being friends...but now she would never look at him the same way. 

"May, is it?" She whispered, reaching her hands out and securing them on the old woman's shoulders. "He's fine. He's gone to get help." 

Just as this lie left her lips something swung into view. A vision of red and blue tights, standing defensively in front of her and May... Spider-Man. 

"I knew you'd show up if I trashed enough places, Spider Loser." The ball of light spoke. "And this time you will not triumph against, Will o' the Wisp!"

At this very moment many of you will be realising that the title of this horrible chapter was, in fact, not a typo. Others will be wondering why the narrator is introducing yet another obscure character instead of injecting the forced romance. Well, he's only here for one reason; to make sense of the cringingly unfunny title. Unfortunately for our friendly neighbourhood Spider-Man, that also means demolishing any hope of having a normal day...and making him look like a coward in front of the girl he likes - but hey, it was worth it. 

"Why do all you criminals feel the need to declare yourselves whenever you appear?" Spidey quipped, crossing his arms and shaking his head. "And why is it always in bold like some comic book strip?"

"Enough talk. I was locked away for a long time because of you, I'm here to return the favour." The bundle of light increased to unbelievable levels...but Spider-Man continued to look directly at him. "What the hell? You should not be able to gaze upon me for so long without burning your retinas..."

Spidey smirked underneath his mask. "I got new lenses. You think I would just wait for you to break out and temporarily blind me again? I'm offended that you think I'm that stupid." 

The Wisp grumbled in fury, and in the span of two seconds, he had transformed from an ethereal ball of light to a solidly-built man that looked as if he'd pounced right out of the 70s. He had long, flowing blonde locks and a green suit that left nothing to the imagination. "It doesn't matter. Defeating you will be much too easy."

"Yeah that's what you said last time, Wispy." Spider-Man retorted with a dull tone. He really was getting tired of all these one-off villains showing up. Emphasis on 'on-off' because most of them probably won't show up again, let's be honest. 

A fight was about to ensue, that much was clear. It could have been a battle for the ages, one to be passed down with the likes of Ultron...but more likely, it was just going to be a filler fight; created to compensate for the fact that his name was used in the title. Strap in for a completely mediocre clash of two decently powered beings...in the next chapter.


End file.
